The Curtain Descending
by through-the-eye-of-a-needle
Summary: 'Quickly, she drops the ring over the side, watching as it spins and spins and lands with a splash. There is no going back, not now.' Vignettes, missing scenes and re-tellings from The Crimson Field.
1. No Going Back

**A/N **Over the last few weeks, I have developed a deep love for The Crimson Field - so much so that I've been constantly watching it on repeat whenever I can. Therefore, I figured I'd write fanfiction to get it out of my head - and this is the result. Enjoy! N xx.

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**I. No Going Back**

**Boulogne, 1915**

She stands in the prow of the ship, watching as the steel-coloured waves part before the keel like butter parting before a hot knife. The sky is cloudy, dull, and the handrail is rusting from the attack of the salty spray. It would be so simple to tip herself over the edge, to end the suffering that has wound itself into a deep knot inside her chest. No one would mourn her death, just like no-one had wept as she embarked aboard the ship to take her to France. No-one will worry if she's getting enough sleep at night, if she's eating well, if the people at whichever hospital she is assigned to are kind.

No, they wouldn't. But that is the reason she's here in the first place.

Like a bird freed from its cage, she's flown the life she'd always known, the one of deferential servants and soft carpets and the feeling that she was always being observed. Here she will re-create herself. No more judgemental glances and mocking smiles. No more pretences and appearances. She doesn't have any regrets.

Well, she has one. But that will stay locked between her ribs until she dies and they cut her open to find it engraved on her heart. No-one will know of the shame, the despair. No-one.

When the ship docks at Boulogne, she takes a deep breath of French air, almost tasting the gun-metal tang of it, hearing the faint rumble of what could be thunder in the distance. But it's not thunder, of course it isn't. It's the big guns, rolling out death across no-man's land, flying shrapnel and blood and screams.

She takes another breath, and pulls the ring out of her pocket, turning it over so that it glints coldly in the pale light. It is a symbol of everything she left behind, the wealth, the pain, the fear. Quickly, she drops it over the side, watching as it spins and spins and lands with a splash. There is no going back, not now.


	2. Daring

**A/N **Six reviews in barely a day? I can't believe it guys! Thank you to the three guest reviewers and here is the next chapter!

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**II. Daring**

As she steps onto French soil, she feels as though there is a weight slowly being lifted off her shoulders. The quayside is bustling, men in khaki swarming everywhere like ants, older men bellowing orders to younger ones. She picks up her bags, walks quickly, purposefully, down the paved dock, ignoring the wolf-whistles. Never again will she be an object, to be treated by men as they please.

"Hey, miss, you one of them volunteer nurses? Can you soothe my brow, I feel a bit feverish?" a youthful soldier calls after her and she half-turns her head, one eyebrow raised.

"You look fine to me," she says, and the soldier's friends burst out laughing like a small, raucous flock of birds. With a roll of her eyes, she goes on, passing crates of straw and bottles, weak sunlight filtering through the clouds. In her old life, no-one would dare to speak to her like that, but, she thinks, it's over now. _I'm just another person, another volunteer nurse come over to do her bit, no-one special, no-one out of the ordinary._

Some people spend their lives trying to break free of the mundane, and here she is, huddling into it as though it's an old comforter, a blanket like the one…

No. Must not think about that.

"Oh, are you one of us?"

She stops, turns. A young woman, only of the only among the hive of men, dressed in a plum travelling suit. A smile beams from her face. "I didn't see you on the boat," she continues, picking up what could only be a floral cake tin and her trunk.

"I didn't feel very well." The lie slips out with frightening ease. But then again, lies are the cloak she will have to cover herself with.

"Oh, quite a few girls didn't," the other commiserates. "I'm Flora, by the way."

"Catherine," Kitty says, weaving her way past large wooden boxes stacked on top of each other like a child's playthings.

Flora chatters on in this vein as they continue down the side of the docks, rather like a little sparrow singing to the world of an early morning. It's funny, for a while, to have someone of almost her own age be so talkative about things other than fashion and the latest scandal, but by the time they have reached the exit of the dock, Kitty is growing weary of her incessant babble.

"Oh look," Flora spots another young woman, a red-head, standing and looking about anxiously as though some man would try to spirit her off if she wasn't careful. "Hello again," she says to the red-head with a cheerful smile.

The red-head looks startled for a second, then manages a soft hello. "Catherine, this is Rosalie. I met her on the boat. Oh, there are the others! Shouldn't we follow them?"

Rosalie shakes her head timidly. "No, they were led off and I was told to wait here."

"Oh, that's strange. Perhaps they're going to a different hospital. What do you think, Catherine?"

Kitty doesn't get a chance to reply.

"Finally, the stragglers." A barrel chested man in khaki appears, looking them over rather contemptuously. "What do you think this is, a Sunday afternoon stroll in England? Follow me."

Kitty watches as Flora and Rosalie glance uncertainly at each other. They have probably never been spoken to like that in their cossetted little lives. Sighing, she picks up her trunk and begins to follow, the two others falling into line behind her like ducklings following their mother.

As they move through the wooden-slatted and metal framed warehouse that seems to serve as an exit, the man begins to speak as though this is a list he's memorised many times. "Keep your papers with at all times, do not let go of your luggage, do not let go of anything valuable – you'll never see it again. Transport."

He stands for a second, and Kitty looks up at the open-topped truck with its engines idling.

"Where are we going? Rosalie asks.

"Hospital 25A," the barrel-chested soldier barks. "Not far from the front. Hope you're looking lively."

And with that, he turns on heel and marches away, clipboard held tightly under one arm. As they watch his figure disappear into the dock, there is a buzzing sound overhead like wasps in an orchard of windfalls.

"Look!" Flora breathes as two planes coming roaring overhead, their wings bright and pilots waving from the front. "I've only ever heard about them on the news – aren't they spectacular?"

"Very," Rosalie says. "Now, come on, we'd better hurry."

* * *

The drive takes them three hours – three hours of dull fields and sullen skies, that ever distant rumbling growing closer as though the storm is approaching. Rosalie and Flora sit opposite Kitty on the metal seats bolted to the sides of the truck, Flora beginning to talk again as soon as the truck jolted off, waxing lyrical about all number of things.

After a while, Kitty tunes her out, pulling a cigarette from her bag. It's a habit she's gotten into over the years – her mother has always called it vulgar – but if film stars do it, she doesn't see any reason not to.

"You're very daring," Flora says as Kitty places the long white stick between her lips, looking for her lighter. "Might I have one?"

"Flora!" Rosalie's tone is shocked, and Kitty smiles a little inside. _I bet she doesn't realise how prissy she sounds. _

She shrugs, pulls another out of the case, lighting it and handing it over. When Flora coughs, an almost-real-smile tugs at her features. She coughed too, when she first tried a cigarette. It was disgusting. But time smoothes over little things like that, and now, whilst never a heavy smoker, it calms her down.

They sit in silence for most of the rest of the journey, Flora playing with the smoking cigarette between her gloved fingers, occasionally taking another puff and screwing up her face as though it disagreed with her. Rosalie turns her body away from the two of them, looking out at the fields that roll out behind them. Endless, endless fields.

It's strange, Kitty thinks, that when one has grown up in a city, there's something so beautiful, so ordinary about green fields. Something that would be so boring, so commonplace to any country-girl is amazing to her. How can there be so much grass?

Eventually, they meet up with several other trucks carrying what look to be supplies, and they travel in convoy down a sandy-coloured road. The swoosh of the sea almost drowns out the thunder of the guns, though every now and again, there's a faint orange flash against the horizon.

"Hospital 25A," Flora says as they approach a gateway in the fence that has loomed large in their view, tent-tops in grey and brown that are stark against the backdrop of the green, green forest. "I wonder what it's going to be like."

"Too late to have second thoughts," Kitty replies dryly as the truck rolls through the gate.

The first thought she has is people. There are so many, more than at the docks, several men in braces and shirts lounging in chairs under the shady embrace of the trees, nurses in grey and maroon uniforms bustling about, men in uniform, men with bandages swathed all over their visible limbs.

The truck draws to a halt, and already a couple of men are approaching, unchaining the gate of the truck and lowering the back. Flora and Rosalie stand first, take the hands offered and descend, stumbling a little as their feet touch the earth. Kitty takes a breath and approaches the edge of the truck.

Dark eyes meet eyes the colour of the waves of the sea.

The weight falls back onto her shoulders, knocking the breath out of her lungs.

He proffers a hand, and she glances at it for a second, trying to steady her heart. _You are here to work, Catherine Trevelyan, _not _to fall for the first handsome man who offers you a hand. _Raising her eyebrows, she takes hold of the edge of the rail and steps down gracefully, chin jutting out defiantly.

He shakes his head and climbs into the back of the truck to retrieve their luggage. She joins the others, forcing herself not to glance over her shoulder.

Why? 


	3. A Matter of Perspective

**A/N **This little missing scene came from the moment in the first episode where Thomas goes to help the VADs down from the truck and Miles says 'I want a full report later.' Thank you to the guest reviewers - I appreciate it so much!

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**III. A Matter of Perspective**

"So, what are they like?" Miles leans back in his chair, propping his hands behind his head. Thomas looks up from his typewriter, an irritated furrow creasing his brow at being interrupted.

"Who?"

"Come on, the Voluntary Aid Detachment." Miles pronounces the last three words with a flourish. "What are they like?"

"They seem alright," Thomas says.

**(**He decides not the mention that dark-eyed glance that arrowed through his ribs like a lightning-bolt.)

"You are a truly awful reporter, my friend," Miles complains. "Anything else than alright? Beautiful? Charming?"

Thomas shrugs. "Why don't you go and see for yourself?"

"Come on, Tom. It won't kill you to turn away from that typewriter for two seconds. Now, what are they like?"

Seeing that he will not be given the peace he craves until he tells Miles, he turns in his chair, grumbling to himself. Damn Miles' persistence.

"There's a red-head, a brunette and a dark-haired one."

"Beautiful?"

"You could say that."

"Anything else?"

"The brunette's a chatterbox. The other two seem quite reserved – one of them as far as to call her haughty, I guess."

"Wonderful. Haughty. I love a challenge," Miles grins and Thomas bites back a sigh. He shouldn't have said that; why did he say that? Now Miles will go running after the dark-haired one, the one whose eyes burned into him as she refused his hand.

Ach well – it will be good for him to get rejected. Not that being rejected would hurt his confidence – being run over by a team of carthorses wouldn't so much as bruise Miles' confidence.

"Now you can get back to your article."

"Am I supposed to thank you?" he asks dryly and Miles laughs, picking up _Tarzan and the Apes_ from where it lies discarded on his desk.

After a while, Thomas looks up again to see Miles completely immersed in the book. "I don't understand how you can read that so many times and not get bored."

"My dear chap," Miles sits upright, turns the book upside down and smiles devilishly. "It's all a matter of perspective."


	4. Flora's Folly

**A/N **This next one is based on what I thought Kitty was feeling during Flora's grilling by Matron. Enjoy!

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**IV - Flora's Folly**

"I imagine it's a little different to what you're used to." The grey-haired, smiling nurse who introduced herself as Sister Quayle holds open the flap of a large, tee-pee shaped tan-coloured tent, gesturing for the three young women to go inside. Kitty has to duck her head to enter, and bites the inside of her cheek as she straightens.

Four iron beds, neatly made with grey blankets and one white pillow each. Overturned crates by the side, serving as bedside tables. A fly buzzes up near the roof. Oh, how different it is from sheets of Egyptian cotton and gold leaf on the ceilings. Different – horrible, any of her friends might have exclaimed – but so normal. So this is how field nurses live.

Kitty threw her carpet-bag onto the bed on the left-hand side, sitting down and looking around. A little light came through the material of the tent, and a large metal pole held the whole structure up.

"I love camping," Flora said, trying to hide dismay in her voice. It could be said for all of them that they were not quite expecting this. "Please, what will we be doing first? Only I'm so much better at some things than others."

There is a quiet anger behind the kindly eyes of the nurse and her smile stretches wider, pulling over her teeth. "Let's hope that they are the right things, then. Please hurry and change, Matron is expecting to see you in uniform."

With that, she ducks under the tent flap and three young women are left alone. Kitty turns away, unclasps the top of her carpet-bag and pulls out the two uniforms. There's one for here – two light-blue dresses with soft collars and aprons – and one for going out; Dark blue, with a smart shirt and tie.

"Well," Flora says, pulling her own uniform slightly crumpled from her bag. "We had better be ready. I wonder what Matron's like – I hope she's nice."

The other two begin to change in silence, and Flora, seeing that she's not going to get a response, lapses into quiet too, shrugging off her coat. They help each other with the buttons at the back and tying on the white headdresses over neatly pinned hair. Once ready, Kitty sits down on her bed. Waiting, now, until Sister Quayle or some other nurse returns.

"I wonder who the fourth bed is for." Flora breaks the stifling silence.

"Perhaps a latecomer, or another nurse," Rosalie says. "I wouldn't pry – we'll find out when they get here."

"Are you ready?" The tent flap opens once more, and Sister Quayle is smiling at them. Kitty stands, slowly, and follows the others outside where the breeze brushes against her face like a lover's fingers. Why does everything have to be so ordered? 'Matron wants to see you in uniform.' 'I hope that they are the right things.' It's not like they're errant schoolgirls – they gave up their lives back home to come and help.

The hospital is larger than Kitty first realised. They pass the fence separating what seems to be a separate encampment – the women's area, informs Sister Quayle. Then it's through lines and lines of washing flapping around, sheets and pyjamas and uniforms and bandages. Then the other tents start – ward tents – and finally, they approach the centre where several wooden-slatted buildings have been neatly constructed with verandas and curtains at the windows.

"This is Matron's office. You do not speak unless she addresses you directly, and even then only a 'yes, Matron' or a 'no, Matron' will usually suffice. Do I make myself clear?" Sister Quayle's eyes have turned steely – there is no hint of the rather false kindness that hung about her on their arrival barely an hour ago left. More like anger. And jealousy.

"Yes, Sister Quayle," they say, Kitty muttering it quieter than the others. All her life she's spoken out against authority – it's in her very nature to defy rules – it will be challenging to bite her tongue now.

Sister Quayle steps up to the door and knocks thrice. "Enter," a stern voice calls.

She holds the door open and they step inside, three in a line and stand before the desk.

Matron is a stern, blonde woman with crevices worn into her face like an old cliff. Her eyes rake over the three of them. That is when Kitty realises Flora is still clutching her floral cake tin.

"What is that?" Matron snaps, her eyes fixed to the tin.

"It's a cake tin, Matron," Flora says. "A fruit-cake. Mrs Bartlett, our cook, makes the most wonderful cakes. Would you care for a piece?"

Inside herself, Kitty is cringing. It is one thing to flout the rules with defiance, quite another to be so innocently naïve about it. A twinge of sympathy rattles through her as Matron says, "Put it down."

It's obvious Flora has never heard quite such a contemptuous tone in her entire life. She stumbles, looking for somewhere to put it, and eventually Sister Quayle takes it from her. Rosalie is glaring, no doubt angry that Flora made a bad impression in the first five minutes.

Matron picks up a sheaf of papers from her desk. "Flora Marshall?"

"Yes, Matron."

"Rosalie Berrick?"

"Yes, Matron."

"Catherine Trevelyan?"

"Matron." Kitty fixes her gaze on the way the sunlight falls through the window to the side of Matron's desk, making a pattern on the floor.

"There are supposed to be four of you – where is Joan Livesy?"

_Why is she angry with us? _Kitty thinks to herself, bunching her hands into fists behind her voluminous skirts. _It's hardly our fault that Miss Joan Livesy decided to be late. It's not like we ate her or something._

"There were only three of us at the meeting point," Rosalie ventures.

"So, Miss Livesy will arrive if and when she feels like it," Matron puts down the papers, looking over them with a gimlet stare. Kitty holds back a shudder – stares like that never mean anything good – at best they mean that you are not wanted, not needed, not respected.

"How old are you Marshall?"

"Nearly twenty-four, Matron."

"No, you're not."

"Oh I am, I've always looked young for my age…"

"You're wearing scent."

Kitty curses inside. Why did she not tell Flora to take it off? She'd smelt it on the truck – surely Rosalie had too – and however irritating Flora could be, it was not fair for her to be picked on twice by Matron in the first fifteen minutes of working under her. She feels bad for the grilling Flora is getting and when Matron begins to list the first things they learnt at training – the rules – her tongue speaks before she can stop it.

"It was only a splash of rose-water, Matron."

Behind her, Sister Quayle is frowning.

Rosalie jumps in. "We all understand the rules, Matron and will abide by them utterly and endeavour to nurse the men to the best of our ability."

Kitty shoots an indignant glare at her. Little miss goody-two-shoes – why hadn't she spoken up in the tent, then Flora could have washed the perfume off before it came to all of this?

"I'll be the judge of that."

* * *

"A well-made bed is essential to a well-run hospital." Matron stands, hands clasped in front of her as the three young women watch Sister Quayle tuck the blanket in over another of the hospital regulation, metal-beds that occupy their tent. "Sister Quayle has shown you _exactly _how it should be done – now, it is your turn. You have two minutes. Begin."

Kitty turns to the pile of freshly laundered sheets and blankets, her hands working almost automatically. This was one of the first things she ever mastered in training – she will never forget the incredulous look on the nurse's face when she had said that she'd never made a bed before. It was true – youngest daughter of privileged parents, wife of a politician, she'd never once made her own bed. Once she got out of it in the morning after breakfast, and vacated the bedroom for the parlour, it was the maids' job to make sure it was made, laundered, ready for the evening. But, then again, up until her training she had never seen a bed such as this before, a metal bar affair with a plain mattress and rough scratchy sheets. She had grown up with four mahogany posts hung with gold brocade and a matching coverlet, she, who had always slept on sheets of Egyptian cotton, could hardly believe that this was the object in which most people slept.

But she has overcome her inability to make beds and she is thanking the nurse at the training facility for making her do it over and over again, pulling everything off if something was not right and shouting until her face went blue.

Several patients are lounging in chairs just outside the canopy that covers this particular ward, calling encouragements and laughing. Kitty ignores them, turning the blanket down and tucking the edge of the sheet in neatly, sharply. The white and the blue-grey look like the waves, like the eyes…no. No, no, no.

"Time's up." Matron strides down to Kitty's bed first, using a little metal ruler to measure the width of the white turn-over, the depth of the mattress to ensure that the blanket has well and truly tucked. Rosalie's passes the inspection, but Matron stops at the end of Flora's. The girl in question smiles apologetically.

"Your uniform is incorrect, Marshall," she says coldly.

"God," Kitty mutters under her breath, only to have Sister Quayle glare at her for a second. How is it fair, that Flora who has only tried her best, is immediately reprimanded for it? Granted, her bed is a mess, the covers wrinkled and the turn-over barely visible, but it is so obvious that no-one has taught her how to do it thoroughly.

"Berrick, Trevelyan, you will make the beds in the next three tents. I will be checking each and every one of them. Marshall, with me."

Flora is led off, chattering about a reference from Lady Cavistock about the excellence of her bandaging. Matron has a face like thunder.

When they are gone, Rosalie and Kitty share a glance.

"Get on with it, then," Sister Quayle says, moving off into the maze of the hospital.

Rosalie and Kitty look at each other again, and start to work.


	5. Testing the Rules

**V. Testing the Rules**

The second tent is easier than the first. Kitty has got into the swing of it, pillow, paper, sheet and blanket, turn-over. Next bed. By the time they enter the third, and she marches up to the far end to start the process all over again, her mind is blank, switched off. Just the way she likes it – if she thinks, she'll start to remember and that won't be good for a first day in a new place. _No, the old life is behind me. _

"Are you called anything for short?" Rosalie breaks her reverie. "Kate? Katy?"

"No."

"Well, Catherine, then. I need to talk to you about something quite important."

"Talk away then." She finishes the turn-over and moved onto the next bed.

"The rules are there for a reason, and we have to follow them. We've all come here to do our duty, and that's not to question and be difficult, but rather to do what's required of us."

Kitty can't believe what she's hearing. A lecture from her fellow volunteer, on their first day?

"They don't want us here."

It is true. The look on both Matron's face and Sister Quayle's, and the nurses who looked at them through narrowed eyes as they made their way from Matron's office to the tent. The catcalls of the men as they made the beds weren't encouragement, it was laughter at a spectacle, nothing more, nothing less. Come and watch these highborn ladies, our social betters, make our beds and clean our bandages. Posh ladies bending to dirty their hands – oh what great entertainment.

"We're being tested, just as Britain is being tested. You really are being rather selfish, you do know that? Muttering under your breath when Matron is speaking, being defiant and impertinent. It reflects badly on all of us, and Lord knows that Flora's made a bad enough impression of herself today already. You wouldn't want to bring a bad name down on all volunteers, would you?"

Kitty shakes the sheet out in a snap of crisp cotton. "God forbid," she says, but the sarcasm is lost on Rosalie.

"I'm glad you've seen sense. Now, shall we put our best foot forward and be friends."

"I didn't come here to make friends." Rosalie is starting to irritate Kitty – at least with Flora she's harmless. If Rosalie knew what she'd been through, if Rosalie realised, she would get down from her pulpit and stop preaching saintliness to someone who lost all belief in God years ago. "Especially not with a hypocrite."

"I'm not a hypocrite!" Rosalie's brow furrows and she looks genuinely hurt for a second. Kitty feels a small needle of remorse in the space where her heart is, but ignores it, ploughing onwards.

"What are you? Thirty? The embarrassing unmarried daughter? A drain, a weight to be endured, getting in the way, gathering dust? But thank Christ for the war, at last function, purpose, and meaning! You didn't volunteer out of duty. You volunteered to escape."

Kitty knows she's being needlessly cruel, and she knows why. It isn't how she used to be. But history has changed her, and Rosalie has been going the right way about pressing all the wrong buttons.

Tears glint in Rosalie's eyes like rain, and Kitty turns away, marches out of the tent. The only way she'll ever forget is to do mindless work and if Rosalie keeps talking to her like that, like she's done something awful…but then again, she has, hasn't she?

She pushes past the other tents, into the washing area where damp sheets flap towards her like wings and out the other side, past picnic benches where bandaged men sit opposite each other talking and playing cards.

Her heart pounding and a blush rising with shame, she fumbles for a cigarette to calm herself down, lighting it and taking in a long, slow breath. The feel of it between her teeth calms her down.

"Got a spare one, nurse?" a patient asks from one of the benches. "I'm gasping."

She nods mechanically and walks over, sitting down beside him, holding the cigarette up for him to take a puff. There are long, deep gouges on his cheek, and bandages swathe one eye and the other side of his head. But then again, since he is up and about, it must not be too serious.

After a while, she just hands the cigarette over. "Alright now?"

"Yes, thank you, nurse," the man says. Kitty pats his shoulder and stands – a minute ago, she could have sworn there was someone staring at her icily from behind, but now there was no-one there. Her foolish imagination, conjuring spectres from thin air.

* * *

An hour later she stands in front of Matron's desk. The pattern of sunlight is gone and she meets the Matron's sharp steel-coated gaze with her chin held high.

"You disobeyed an order."

"I needed some fresh air." She doesn't even both to tack the word 'Matron' onto the end of the sentence. The woman has done nothing to gain her respect, and therefore Kitty will not use such a title for her.

"You disobeyed an order," Matron repeats as though Kitty is a young child who cannot quite understand. "You were told to make beds in the three new tents."

"For a moment, yes. But the soldier asked me for a cigarette."

"You should have asked an orderly to help him and returned immediately to your task."

"I thought it was more important to help the soldier." Honestly, the woman is making a mountain out of a molehill.

"You thought that helping him was more important than my order."

Kitty raises her chin even higher, and stares the older woman out. "Yes, Matron, I did."

"Then you will be reprimanded in the strongest possible terms."

Kitty almost laughs, but turns into a quiet exhalation at the last moment, turning her head to the side to look out of the window. Does the Matron really think she's going to scare her? After everything she's been through? Being reprimanded won't come close to the fear, the agony, the shame, the…stop.

Perhaps that is why her tone is so insolent when she turns back to the Matron. "For helping a man to smoke a cigarette? He asked me for help, was I supposed to walk away?"

How is it fair that she is being told off for helping? Isn't that what the volunteers are here to do?

"Why are you here, Miss Trevelyan?" Matron bites out. "You seem incapable of respecting the most simple, necessary rules."

"Was it quite necessary to be so vindictive against Miss Marshall? To humiliate her so publicly? Was that in the rules or more about proving a point to Sister Quayle?"

Kitty knows she's overstepped a line when Matron pulls a piece of paper from a drawer and slams it down in front of her, scribbling viciously.

After a moment's silence, she speaks.

"Your marching orders, Miss Trevelyan. I have no use for you. The convoy leaves with the Blighty cases at eight, now get out of my sight."

Kitty snatches the piece of paper from Matron's hand. "With pleasure," she snaps, turning and slamming the door behind her. Anger pulses through her veins instead of blood – (stupid, stupid – it's only her first day and already she's being sent away). But it's not just anger at herself, it's anger at the injustice, the way Matron seemed to pick on them like they were children and she was older, like they were not here out of the goodness of their hearts.

Well, only Flora is here for that reason, it seems.

Back in the tent, she furiously rips the uniform from her body, changes into her civilian skirt and ruffled blouse, snapping her bag shut and sitting on the bed. She barely even had time to unpack.

Now it's back to England, to people who don't want her and never will, to a life of being laughed at behind hands and rejected by people she thought of as friends.

How could she have been so stupid?

* * *

**A/N Important! **Okay, guys, I have an apology to make. I have exams that start Thursday and run to the 16th of June. Updates will probably come as writing is a good break for me, but they _will _be sporadic. Just a warning now. Thank you so much to Guest and Steph for reviewing and if you have any scenes, missing or canon that you want told, drop me a line in a review or PM and I'll use them - anything is useful, especially for what you want to see _between _episodes! N xx.


	6. Mulloy (Trapped)

**VI – Mulloy (Trapped)**

By half-past seven, it is raining and soldiers are helping the Blighty cases into the convoy trucks. Amputees, mostly, hopping on crutches in their pyjamas and dressing gowns. Kitty sits under a canvas shelter, watching as the rain pounds into the mud, making little shallow indentations like fingers into dough.

Shame tugs at her insides at the harsh words she said to Rosalie earlier in the afternoon. She can't leave without saying sorry. She knows she can't. Making a split-second decision, she gathers up her bags and makes for the third ward tent, the one where she left Rosalie. The canvas sides have been put up and she ducks into it, dropping her bag near the entrance.

There is a rustling from the curtains at the end. "Rosalie?" she calls, walking down the centre aisle between the two rows of beds. "Rosalie, is that you? I'm about to leave, but I have to say something first."

She pushes the curtains aside but it isn't Rosalie, it's a man, a patient in striped pyjamas.

"Sorry," she says, disappointment rushing through her. "I thought you were someone else."

She begins to back away, but then his hand has closed on her wrist and he is pulling her forward and she's stumbling back into a memory and God no, not this, anything but this, he pushes her backwards onto one of the beds she made earlier and then there is a pair of scissors at her throat…

"If you try to get away, if you breathe one word," the patient growls, "I'll cut your whore's throat."

There is congealed blood on his neck and chin and sweat on his face. His breathing is laboured. She holds as still as she can, feeling the cold metal at her neck, the fear pounding in her head like a hammer.

"I've done it before," the man continues. "And I'll do it again like its nothing." His hand grips into her shoulder with bruising force.

"What do you want?" she asks. Her whole body is trembling with the effort of keeping still, just keeping still. The bars of the bed cut into her knees through her skirt.

"You're going to give me a life."

Someone pushes the entrance to the main tent aside. Hope flares in her like a candle lighting in the dead of night.

"Mulloy?" A man's voice calls, but Kitty can't, daren't cry out to him. Then footsteps, leaving the tent.

"Mulloy, is that you?" Kitty whispers. "They're looking for you." She tries to plead with her eyes, but he doesn't relent. If anything the scissors press closer into the tender skin. "They're the ones that can help you – I can't."

"He's coming for me," the man, Mulloy, breathes. There's a hint of insanity in his eyes. "He's coming for me, and I need you to help me hold on. All the things I've done and He's coming."

There is fresh blood staining the bandages that poke out of the top of his pyjama shirt. Blood drips from his mouth and down off his chin, onto her shirt.

"There's something coming out of my mouth," he says hoarsely. "Wipe it."

She reaches up and quickly wipes it away with a handkerchief from her pocket. She hasn't been so scared since she left…left…no…

"Show me."

Shaking like a leaf in a storm now, she holds it up. It's stained with blood.

"You bitch, you said you'd keep me alive," he snarls, pushing the scissors closer.

Kitty screws up her eyes. "No, I didn't, I didn't." It feels as though the Fates are closing their scissors around the string of her life, ready to snip it at any second. "I can't, I can't, they can…"

The scissors dig in deeper, painfully and she's taking great gulps of the air.

"I'll take you with me, you lying bitch! I've got nothing else to lose." The madness has come over him again and her life flashes before her eyes, her daughter's brown-eyed gaze and dark, dark hair, her mother's cold steely glare, the sound of _him _laughing…

"Well stop talking about and do it," she snaps. "Go on."

For a long time, there is only the sound of his ragged breathing.

"I've got nothing left either, so go ahead. What are you waiting for?"

"No, no, you should be begging for your life. Go on, beg, beg…"

The fear recedes in a rush of clarity and she looks into Mulloy's eyes. "I'm not begging you for anything."

Then his weight is off her and so is the pricking of the metal at her neck and he's on his knees, crying. She sits up, slowly, pressing one hand to still her racing heart. She's alive. She's still alive.

"I'm dying," Mulloy says, his voice wracked with sobs, and suddenly she sees past him to a man who is scared of the inevitable, who has done terrible things and is so, so scared…

"I won't leave you," she says. "I'll stay with you. Let's get you into bed."

He is heavy, a deadweight, but somehow she manages it, pulling the covers up over him and propping his head up with two pillows. There is blood staining his shirt now, so much blood and she sits beside him, lets him grasp her hand.

She stays for a long time, listening the death-rattle in his breathing. In the end, a silhouette appears at the end of the ward. She takes her lighter from her pocket, lights it. The orange flame flickers in the shadows. It's Matron.

She advances down the ward towards Kitty, anger setting her face in deeper lines. "The convoy's left, why aren't you on it?"

"Sshh," Kitty says just as Mulloy speaks.

"Who is that?"

"No-one for you to be scared of," she whispers, rubbing her thumb in circles across the back of his palm.

There is sympathy instead of steel in the Matron's look, and she leaves, only to return with a proper lantern and a bowl of warm water. Kitty begins to bathe Mulloy's face gently, rubbing away the bloody phlegm from his lips.

"When I killed her, it wasn't deliberate," he wheezes. "Will you tell her, tell her I didn't mean it? Will you tell her I'm sorry?"

There's a lump in Kitty's throat, so she just nods. There is silence, and then the life leaves him in one long, slow breath.

Matron reaches over to close his eyes.

Kitty sits and stares. It's the first time she's ever seen a man die.

* * *

**A/N **A couple of people asked for this scene - thank you! Please keep the requests coming in, they're all very useful!


	7. Miles

**VII. Miles**

She is sitting quietly at one of the picnic tables of the canteen, reading over her letter to Private Mulloy's mother. Matron has seen fit to keep her on after that episode, thank God. No more quiet returns to a quiet existence in London. Learning how to work, perhaps, taking in washing. No-one in her old society would want to see her back.

"How's the first day been, volunteer?" A man's voice breaks her train of thought and she starts, glancing up over the letter.

He's a young man, a captain by the cuffs on his uniform, bright-eyed and smiling. "My esteemed colleague said that none of you could be considered beautiful – he was lying and blind, evidently."

Kitty heaves an internal sigh. One of the ones who likes the sound of his own voice – oh, she knows far too many of those from her season in London and from the endless balls and parties she had attended as a society wife.

She glances up to where the 'colleague' leans against one of the poles supporting the canopy, his hat held against his chest. Bored-looking, tall, with…with…blue grey eyes the colour of the waves of the sea…it's him. The man from this morning, whose hand she refused as she stepped down from the truck. Her heart begins to beat a pattern against the constraints of her ribcage and corset and she quickly looks back down at her letter, reading it through again and feigning indifference. Perhaps the talkative one will leave her alone.

He turns to the 'colleague' and whispers, "Shy. How sweet."

She bristles at the comment, but refuses to let anything show. She will not rise to the bait, she will not say something she's sure to regret later.

Then the 'colleague' speaks up, a soft Scottish brogue that's unlike the hard, polite English accents she's so used to. "I apologise for my friend. He seems to think he's dashing. Leave her alone, Miles."

So unused to anyone taking her side, Kitty blinks a second, trying to keep her gaze fixed on the ink marching across her paper like a column of black ants.

The talkative one, Miles, leans across the table very seriously and Kitty finally decides to grace him with an unamused stare. "You know what they call the VADs," he asks. She raises one eyebrow.

"The Very Adorable Darlings. I think it suits you perfectly."

Patronising git. The Scottish 'colleague' snorts, whether at what Miles has said or at her expression, she's not sure.

"You know, my father gave me a piece of advice about women, shall I tell you what it is? He said never marry a woman who holds your look for too long, it means trouble."

She can't resist a sarcastic comment for this. He's ridiculous and not in the way that makes one laugh. "And you always take your father's advice, do you?"

"Most of the time – except in matters of the heart."

"And I suppose you are the type to do what everyone tells you?" She's had enough of idiotic men who think they can win a woman over with soft, sweet words and a dazzling smile. She stands, gathering her letter and pen, picking up the lamp and leaves, her blue skirts swishing behind her.

Somewhere in the background of the noise, she can hear his Scottish friend laughing.

* * *

"Stop laughing," Miles stands up, making a faux-threatening gesture towards him.

"You had it coming – even I could tell she wasn't interested," Thomas says as he composes himself, placing his hat back on his head and straightening up.

"You didn't help."

"And was I supposed to? I thought you were dashing enough to manage the ladies on your own?"

Her eyes are as dark as he remembered, like black thunderclouds, and the way she has so easily put down Miles is astonishing. No other woman has ever proved impervious to Miles' charms – not even Matron, out of whom Miles seems to be one of the only ones able to coax a smile.

This earns Thomas a slap on the shoulder as Miles falls into step beside him. "I'm perfectly dashing, thank you, Captain Gillan."

"We'll see about that."

"I'll wager you that I'll get a smile in under a week."

"I don't think you will, and you know I don't gamble."

"Come on, Tom. I can get a smile out of you. And out of Matron. And even out of Sister Quayle. I promise you, within the week she'll be smiling."

Thomas raised an eyebrow as the two ducked into their tent. "Don't come crying to me when she doesn't."

"Oh, I won't," says Miles, sitting down on his bed. "I promise you that."

Thomas writes for a while on his typewriter, preparing the article for the Royal Society of Surgeons, but sooner than later that haughty face creeps into the back corners of his mind, the elegant features and her eyes bore holes into his thoughts.

Cursing silently under his breath, he puts the cover back over the typewriter and gets ready for bed.

* * *

**A/N **I had so much fun writing this chapter, I mean, who doesn't love Miles? Thank you to Guest for reviewing, it was lovely to hear from you, and now, any missing scenes requests from between episodes 2 and 3 or any from episode 3 onwards would be greatly appreciated. N xx.


	8. A Rose By Any Other Name

**VIII. A Rose by Any Other Name**

The next morning as he's doing his rounds on one of the wards, Nurse Jesmond appears leading a new woman in a nurse's uniform. He didn't realise they were getting another nurse.

"This is my ward – yours will be the same – I'll just run you through the routines. It might be different from what you're used to…"

"I'll adapt," the new nurse says confidently.

Out of the corner of his eye, he notices the dark-haired VAD push aside the tent flap with a trolley full of clean bedding. A couple of men died during the night, and it seems as though she has been tasked with re-making the beds. She glances towards him for a second and he immediately looks down at his clipboard.

"I suppose you've met Miss Trevelyan," Nurse Jesmond says to the new nurse.

"Yes, we're sharing a tent," the new nurse smiles, and there is an almost-smile in Miss Trevelyan's eyes. He reaches out for the clipboard at the foot of another patient's bed, pretending to ignore their conversation. He now knows her name, well, half of it. It bizarrely pleases him that he knows more about her than Miles does.

"Captain Gillan?" Nurse Jesmond calls from across the ward. He half-turns, raising an eyebrow. "I'd like you to meet our new nurse, Sister Joan Livesy. Sister Livesy, this is Captain Gillan, one of our surgeons."

"Pleasure," he says shortly, turning back to the clipboard and the patient watching him from the bed. "How is it feeling? Any pain? Any bleeding?"

"No sir," the man answers. "Just…"

"Yes, I know," Thomas nods. "Better your arm than your life."

The man nods, shakily and Thomas turns. "Nurse Jesmond will re-dress it for you on her rounds this morning. Stay as still as you can. I'll be back later to examine it."

"Sir."

Thomas turns towards where Sister Livesy and Nurse Jesmond are still talking. "Any others I need to see, Nurse?" he asks.

She thinks for a second. "Not on this ward, sir."

Miss Trevelyan finishes the bed she is making and straightens up, rubbing her hands together for a second, then taking hold of the trolley and pushing it up the centre aisle, past him. He stands aside to let her pass and she murmurs a quick thanks before leaving. For some strange reason, he can smell the salt of the sea on the air that trails in her wake like a cloak.

* * *

The second day is strangely easier than the first – well, anything is better than the rather hellish day she endured yesterday. When Matron gives her an order, she lowers her head and murmurs assent, taking care not to disobey. She's walking a fine line – one slip and she'll be back to a meaningless existence in the grey smoke and paved streets of London.

It feels so strange to be up so early. This morning, she was awake with the birds, and dressed and breakfasted almost before the sun had begun to rise. And now she's going between the ward tents with a trolley of linen, re-making beds of those who have died during the night. There's no time for grief, a bed is vacated, made, and re-used right away.

She pulls open the tent flap and wheels her trolley inside. The nurse on duty is talking to Joan, the volunteer who arrived last night. Well, in actual fact, she isn't a volunteer, but a properly trained nurse. A Sister, but Kitty doesn't really know how that differs from just 'Nurse.'

The first bed is at one end of the ward, and she notices that the Scottish 'colleague' from last night is standing at the end of an occupied bed, making notes on a clipboard. He slants a glance at her and immediately looks back down at his clipboard. She takes a breath and lifts a pile of fresh linen off, beginning to make the bed in swift, practised motions. It's barely been two days and she could easily find employment as a professional bed-maker.

She hears her name, then, and turns slightly to see the nurse on duty waving a hand in her direction. Joan smiles and Kitty lets a half-smile pull up her cheeks. She's nice, Joan. A trained nurse from Liverpool who is good enough to listen to Flora's chatter without letting her mind wander, and to be nice to Rosalie and herself.

(In the end, Kitty did manage to apologise to Rosalie. It took a weight off her chest, and God knows she needs that nowadays.)

Then, "Captain Gillan?"

Kitty watches from the corners of her eyes as the Scottish 'colleague' looks over his shoulder. The nurse on duty introduces the two, and he nods shortly before turning away, back to his patient. So that's his name.

She moves onto the second bed, folding the turn-over neatly, listening to how he asks his patient several questions, then stands back. For a moment, she finds herself wondering where in Scotland he came from and from what kind of life, but then suppresses the thought. It's not her place to find out, it's her place to work.

She didn't come here to get entangled.

* * *

**A/N **Well, now they half-know each other's names! Keep the requests coming in, they're great for me to sift through. Writing wise I've just got up to the convoy, so anything around that time or afterwards is great. Thank you to the Guest reviewers! :)


	9. Fingers and Toes

**IX. Fingers and Toes**

The week merges into a haze of making more beds, cleaning bedpans, washing and rolling bandages and tidying the linen cupboard. It's mindless work, all of it, and for that she's thankful, but through the bustle she sees men arriving, covered in dirt and blood and shaking like leaves.

"I wonder when we'll ever be allowed near _actual _patients," Flora says to her one day as they roll bandages together.

"They don't trust us enough yet," Kitty says. "Wait another few weeks or so and then we'll see."

"Joan is trying to get us more work."

"Joan is new too. She's not going to change things overnight."

Flora subsides into silence, and Kitty goes back to piling bloody bandages into her bucket. Something falls out of one of them with a clang. She starts and peers closer at them, recoiling in horror.

"Flora!"

"What's wrong?"

"Flora, there are fingers in my bucket."

Flora comes over from the mangle, bending over and looking at them. "Oh yes, I've had a few things like that before. Come on – Peter – well, Corporal Foley, showed me what to do with them."

Kitty hears her through a strange buzzing in her ears. Fingers. Fingers that used to belong to a man and now they don't and…

"Kitty, are you alright?"

Kitty shakes herself. _Get a grip, Catherine. _"Yes, I'm fine, Flora. What do we do with them?"

Flora picks up the bucket and Kitty trails her, forcing herself to stay calm. How is she ever going to make it as a nurse if she feels faint at the sight of amputated fingers?

"It's quite alright. I had a nasty shock when several toes fell out of my bandage. I shrieked so loud that the birds started flying away. But it's simple really; you just put them into the furnace. Peter laughed at me when I said a prayer for the toes, but I do that most times when no-one's looking. I think it's nice, you see, to pray for the person who has lost them. Imagine not having any toes! Or fingers!"

Flora's chatter helps to calm Kitty down, and she feels the embarrassment at her reaction recede like a wave down a shingle beach. Surely it is perfectly reasonable to feel faint when you are first confronted with something like that!

They reach the furnace, a large, stone fig-shaped structure with a gently smoking chimney. Flora hands her the bucket. "I'll open the door and you can throw them in."

The flames roar quietly to themselves inside as Flora opens the door. Kitty shuts her eyes for a second and throws in the fingers, hoping that she doesn't miss and will have to pick them up. Luckily, they all make it in.

Flora locks and bolts the furnace door and both young women stand back for a second, Flora pressing her hands together and Kitty following her lead. She closes her eyes and thinks of the poor soldier languishing somewhere in the hospital without any fingers.

Suddenly she's glad that she was born a girl, and has never faced the fear of going to war and losing limbs.

* * *

**A/N **So obviously Flora had this particular experience first, but I was wondering how the others would react - in particular, Kitty. Thank you very much to the Guests! Is anyone else on complete tenterhooks for tonight's episode?


	10. A Letter, Miss

**X. A Letter, Miss.**

Two weeks have gone by, and she is sitting on one of the picnic tables on a well-earned break, her cigarette smoking from between her fingers. The breeze rustles her skirts and teases loose strands from her hair, and she leans back, enjoying the peacefulness of it all. She wishes it would last, but a convoy arrives in a few days, and no-one will be getting any calm until the flood of wounded has dried once again to its usual trickle.

One of the quartermaster's assistants appears from behind one of the tents. "Letter for you, Miss," he says, approaching and putting it down on the table beside her before plucking the next out of his sack. With it hung over his shoulder, he looks rather like a fortune-hunter headed off in search of gold.

Sighing, she stubs her cigarette out and turns her attention to the letter. It's light – not heavy like the gushing ones Flora has received from home – and on fine cream stationery with smart black calligraphy. Her hand begins to shake as she slits it open; there's no-one to see her, here.

She might as well read it now. Get it out of the way.

_Catherine,_

_I am writing to inform you that your daughter has been installed in our mother's household and that she is settling well. My wife is taking care of her along with our own children. We have told her that her mother has gone to be with God and I exhort you never to contact her again. She need never know that she has an adulteress as a mother._

_Alistair Trevelyan, Baronet._

Tears begin to tremble in her eyes, blurring her vision until the grass, sky and tents resemble an impressionist's painting. How can he be so cruel? He knows exactly what she went through, he knows so well and yet he chooses to side with her husband, to separate her from her own flesh-and-blood, to…

"Miss Trevelyan?" A shadow falls across her vision and she looks up, wiping away the tears angrily. "Is there anything the matter?"

It's him. If she hadn't recognised the voice before in the haze of her misery, she did now. There was concern hidden in the depths of his eyes and suddenly she is struck by a desire to tell him everything, to spill out her heart, but she is stopped short by the feeling of the letter clenched in her fist. No-one here must know, to them she must just be Miss Trevelyan, not that woman, the one who shamed her husband and lost…

"I'm quite alright, thank you."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, perfectly." She holds up the back of the letter. "My mother is ill, but it's not serious."

"If you're sure." He stands back and lets her rise. The weak sunshine gilds his light brown hair, turns it to strands of molten gold.

"Thank you for your concern," she murmurs and before he can reply, she's gone. Back to bed-making and bed-pan washing and linen-sorting.

She can't let them take away her daughter.

* * *

_"__No, no, no! Get away, go away, please, leave me alone…"_

_"__Oh, but it's too late for that, isn't it? I know what you've been doing, and naughty girls always get punished."_

_She backed away, towards the window. If only it opened wider, she could pitch herself out and this suffering would be over. He advanced as unstoppable as an invading army. His eyes were colourless. Cold. _

_"__Did you ever think you would get away with it?" he drawled slowly, watching the way her whole body trembled with fear at the sound of his voice. "How did you think you would ever get away with it? I know everyone, I see everything."_

_The door opened slowly, then, and her heart leapt. Someone to help her, to save her. It was James, his dark eyes smiling at her._

_"__James, help me, help me!" she begged, but he just stood there, motionless._

_Elliott barely looked around, and then his arms were on either side of her, trapping her, capturing her like a butterfly in a net. She fought frantically, but the whole weight of his body was against her and she couldn't move and…_

_"__Mama!"_

_"__Sylvie, no, go away, no, SYLVIE!"_

Kitty wakes with a start, sitting upright in bed and gasping for breath. Sweat beads on her forehead as she looks around the tent, her breathing slowing as she realises that everyone else is still asleep. Elliott's not here. He can't hurt her anymore – he's in England and she's in France. No-one will let him hurt her.

She can't stay here, whilst the others slumber on.

She slides out of bed, dresses silently like she has the past two nights when the nightmare has receded. But tonight is different, tonight there is an idea whittling a hole through her head. Her brother's letter forbade her from contacting her daughter, but she can still write to her mother.

If her mother forgives her, then perhaps she can prevail upon Elliott to let Kitty see her daughter. It's a faint hope, like a candle at the end of a tunnel, but since that letter it's all she's got to hold on to.

There's no harm writing it with the terrors of her dreams still fresh in her mind. No-one will miss her if she does it now.

She takes her pen, lantern and writing pad and throws a blanket over her shoulders. The camp is utterly silent and still and she begins to walk through the woods and out onto the sand dunes that lie just beyond. The sound of the sea rasping against the sand calms her, and she sits down amongst the tall, sharp grasses beginning to write.

The sun is hovering tentatively on the horizon and the ink is bleeding across her paper by the time she has signed her name, carefully folding the letter and putting it into an envelope. The hospital will be stirring soon.

She rises and tucks the letter into her skirt, picking up the lantern and making her way back.

* * *

People are just beginning to move about as she reaches the post-box outside Matron's office. She takes a breath and slides it into the slot on the top, whispering a quick prayer under her breath. Please write back.

The door to Matron's office cracks open and the woman herself appears, pristine and unruffled. "You again? This is becoming something of a habit."

"I'm a light sleeper," she lies.

The older woman regards her for a second, then the perpetual frown is back. "Make yourself useful."

"Matron."

She walks away, her fist clenched and the lantern swaying. Please write back. She has to write back.

As Kitty looks over her shoulder, she sees Matron unlock the post-box and take out the letters that have accumulated there, before disappearing back into her office and shutting the door. A spark of worry flares, but she quashes it firmly. Reading of letters is random, not systematic, and only for censorship purposes, nothing more.

No-one will ever know. No-one.

* * *

**A/N **I'm just going to say - wow - last night's episode! They finally kissed! Wahay! And Joan is safe, which is a good thing, too. But anyway, this'll be the last chapter before Wednesday night because I have a truly horrid week of exams ahead with what - 7 papers in 3.5 days, so I've kind of got to work instead of write. *sighs*. Reviews make me smile! Love N. xx


	11. Irritation

**XI. Irritation**

When she enters the ward tent that she's been assigned to, Nurse Jesmond point her in the direction of a young, dark-skinned man with bandages on his head and a glazed expression in his eyes. "Would you feed him for me?" she asks distractedly as she changes the bandages on another man's leg.

"Yes, Nurse Jesmond."

Kitty makes a bowl of whisked egg whites and takes it to the young man's bedside, sitting down beside him carefully. His lips move silently, prayers or thoughts she doesn't know, but they still as she holds the spoon up, dripping the frothy liquid carefully into his mouth. It is like when Sylvie was little and Kitty insisted on feeding her herself, much to the chagrin of the nursemaid. Sylvie would refuse to open her mouth, so Kitty would pull funny faces and when her daughter was sufficiently distracted and opening her mouth to laugh, Kitty would put the food in instead.

This is so different though. No laughter, no smiles. Just sorrow at a young man who could have given so much, lying here and whispering soundlessly. She knows she shouldn't think like that, shouldn't feel sad. She is getting better at tuning it all out, the suffering, the agony, the sound of the guns and orange flashes above the treeline. But some cases, like this one, are so pitiful it just creeps back in.

She wouldn't be human if she didn't feel pity.

* * *

The sun has fully come up, and everyone is awake, though Rosalie and Flora have been assigned to a different ward. Nurse Jesmond has gone to fetch more bandages for a dressing round, and Kitty is pottering about, putting things away and making a few beds, passing out food to those who are too badly injured to rise and go to the mess.

One young man sits by the unconscious form of his commanding officer, his arm cradled to his chest in a sling. She watches them for a second, then fetches another bowl of egg whites for the young man she was feeding earlier. A little bit, every few hours, she's been instructed. Don't over face his stomach – if he vomits, he'll choke on it.

This time, nothing goes in – it just dribbles down his chin. She is wiping it away with the cloth when the young private with his arm in the sling speaks up.

"Nurse, he's waking up."

She puts aside the bowl and stands. Another order Nurse Jesmond had given her as she left. If the Major wakes up, go to fetch Captain Gillan. She nods at the young soldier and leaves, shielding her eyes against the bright sunlight. The most likely place for the Captain to be is in theatre, so she'll check there before endeavouring to find his tent among the myriads of others.

She approaches the theatre quickly, only to be greeted by Miles – she's learnt that his formal name is Captain Hesketh-Thorne – who has his arms wide as if to embrace her. "How delightful! Please say you were looking for me?"

She laughs inside at his persistence – he has been constantly trying to flirt with her ever since that first encounter and it has become something of a game to try and find new ways to rebuff him. This time, she settles for a "Nope."

He pretends to look heartbroken as she brushes past. "You do know how to crush a chap's hopes, don't you?"

She ignores that comment and approaches the entrance to the operating theatre, pushing aside the main door-flap. To her left, the curtains are closed, but to her right they are just hanging open and she can see Captain Gillan pulling a sheet across a bloodstain. The person beneath it is not breathing.

She hovers for a second, then takes a breath and pushes open the curtain, stepping inside.

He doesn't even allow her a chance to speak. "You're not allowed in here."

"I know, I…"

"How long have you been standing there?"

"Only a moment," she protests and he glares at her.

"Out."

When she hesitates, his face creases up with anger and he shouts, "Now!"

She steps outside of the curtain, her heart pounding. She's never been shouted at in her life before. It was always tones of quiet disappointment that made tears burn in her throat and Elliott's anger was always silent. Terrifyingly so. But this shout cuts her more than she cares to think about and she clears her throat, forcing herself not to think. Since when did her husband – her ex-husband – start creeping into her thoughts again? She came here to escape, not to constantly remember the…

Captain Gillan shoves the curtains aside. There is blood on his apron.

"Your patient's come round," she says quickly, before he can shout again.

"Name? Or shall I just guess?"

"Major Crecy. I was sent to find you." He still looks angry, but less so and he begins to wipe away the blood on his hands.

He begins to move and a thought flickers across her head. "If you're going to the ward, you might want to take your apron off."

He scowls at her like she's just slapped him and wrenches off the apron, slamming it onto its hook and marching outside without a backwards glance. It hurts more than she dares to admit.

* * *

He is fuming as he crosses the hospital, fuming at her interruption, at her insolence, at his own inadequacy. That patient could have lived if he'd just been quicker. If he'd found the cause more swiftly, that man would still be breathing. It's all his fault.

He knows that this could go around in circles for days on end in his head so he forces himself to stop and take several deep breaths of cold, clean air. He mustn't go onto the wards thinking like this.

He finds the right ward and walks down the centre aisle to where Major Crecy lies, blinking blearily. The young private who came in with him is sitting on the bed next door, anxiously waiting.

Thomas stops at the end of the bed. "How's the pain?"

"Not too bad."

Thomas knows a lie when he sees one, and an almost-smile tugs at the corner of his lips. "I'll get you another half-gram of morphine."

He busies his hands with writing down the dosage on the clipboard by the Major's bed, whilst half-listening to the quiet conversation. It was a miracle that these two survived out of their whole battalion; the Major only lived because Byeford, the private, carried him out of no-man's land, back to their trenches.

"We have to keep you as still as possible," Thomas says. "Risk of haemorrhage."

"I understand," Major Crecy murmurs.

"We sent a letter to your wife."

It's only fair to warn the man.

"Oh, did you think I would die?"

"To be honest, yes."

"You must tell her I'm alive, I don't want her upset."

Thomas raises an eyebrow. "She'll be able to see for herself. She's coming. We'll speak to her first, so she knows what to expect." He moves towards the post above the bed, hanging up the clipboard. "I've been asked to check whether you're sure you don't want to be moved to an officer's ward."

"Absolutely not," the Major rolls his head on the pillow so he can look Thomas straight in the eye.

"I'll get your shot, then." Thomas strides off to the other end of the ward where such things are kept, and begins to prepare it. He may not have saved the man who by now will be lying in the morgue, but this one is still alive, as are many others.

There's no point thinking about death, when evidence of people hanging onto life with both hands is around him right at this very moment.

(A small part of him is giving thanks for the fact he's not in the trenches.)

* * *

**A/N **This is nice and long to make up for the couple of days I haven't been able to update! Thank you for reviewing, guys, it really makes me smile! N xx


	12. Apologies

**XII. Apologies**

The next day Thomas is being summoned to Matron's office to speak with the said wife, who went in search of her husband and had a panic attack when she realised he was without his legs. If only the blasted woman had waited for Matron and himself to explain, then she might not have been so shocked.

But now, he is standing in a corner of Matron's office, trying very hard not to let his irritated expression show.

"It's a lot to take in," Matron says, not unkindly.

"Really? Do you think so?" There is a tone of patronising sarcasm in Mrs. Crecy's voice and he watches Matron bristle. "I received a letter saying that my husband was wounded and dangerously ill, near death, that I should come at once, it said nothing about…could you not have prepared me?"

"I believe you were asked to wait. Had you indeed done as you were told, Captain Gillan and I would have taken you through what had happened and how we are treating your husband. _But _since you chose to take matters into your own hands, we had no time in which to _prepare _you."

Matron looks towards Thomas and he shifts uncomfortably. This is, without a doubt, the worst part of his job, except perhaps when a patient dies. Dealing with distraught relatives who do not understand that what needs to be done is done has never been his forte; he usually leaves them to Miles who is able to soothe them with his mixture of charm and friendliness.

"The surgery was successful," he ventures. "All infection was removed, and barring any haemorrhage, your husband shouldn't need any further operations."

"No, I don't suppose there is much more you can take off. You appear to have been very thorough with your knife, Captain."

He scratches the side of his nose for a second, scrambling for a way to reply. "It's not wilful butchery, Mrs Crecy. It had to be done."

"Why is he in a men's ward?" Mrs Crecy changes the subject swiftly and he relaxes slightly. This is more directed at Matron than at him.

"Mrs Crecy, when your husband was brought in, he was insistent that he should stay with the private who carried him to safety."

A flicker of emotion passes over Mrs Crecy's face and Thomas shifts slightly, hoping that Matron will see fit to dismiss him soon. "It isn't good for the men to see an officer so…diminished."

"Mrs Crecy…"

"It is not appropriate. In fact, it is quite scandalous."

There is a knock at the door and Thomas breathes a silent sigh, finally, he can go back to that medical journal he was reading in preparation for the convoy this evening.

"Enter," Matron calls and the door creaks open. _She _enters, avoiding his gaze, and suddenly remorse begins to tug at him with insistent hands. He shouldn't have shouted at her earlier, it was unfair of him. He'll have to find a time to apologise.

"Mrs Crecy's gloves, Matron," Miss Trevelyan says quietly, putting the articles down on the desk and moving back towards the door, still refusing to look at him.

"Could you show Mrs Crecy to the visitor's accommodation, please?" Matron says, standing and signalling that this meeting is at an end. He cannot help but feel relieved.

"Matron," Miss Trevelyan murmurs. She's still as haughty as she was when she arrived – Miles attests to that most firmly as two weeks have passed and she's not smiled at him once – but the defiant energy that seemed to exude from her very skin has died, replaced with a sort of quiet reserve.

Mrs Crecy jerks his thoughts away from Miss Trevelyan as she stands, raising her chin. "My husband _must _be moved. If you would expedite that right away, I would be most grateful."

Miss Trevelyan holds the door open, and Mrs Crecy swooshes out in a graceful movement of fur and plum dress, not sparing them another glance.

Matron sighs. "Captain Gillan, if you would be so kind as to order two corporals who are no doubt loitering to move Major Crecy."

"Yes, Matron," he says, fitting his hat back onto his head and ducking out into the freshness of the morning.

* * *

Kitty emerges from one of the visitors' tents fuming. That woman! She is quite beyond belief – surely she could see the bond the two men have formed, a bond cemented by months under fire and Private Byeford's heroic actions in carrying her husband in whilst wounded himself! But no, she just chooses to hide behind blinkered, age-old views that because the private is a commoner and not a gentleman, then she will not countenance her husband to stay with him.

She knew too many women like that from her time in London, and frankly, she has always hated it. And now 'class' has to invade the hospital too. Class above bravery, above a man's choice.

But there is no point being angry, she knows that now. Never any point – there's nothing she can do to change Mrs Crecy's opinions, so she might as well put it out of her head. She has a meeting with Matron, now, and back to Matron's office she hurries, her headdress snapping out behind her.

She knocks, and Matron bids her to enter.

"Miss Trevelyan. Your probation meeting – have a seat."

Kitty seats, fisting her hands in her lap. She's tried so hard to work and to keep her mouth shut, because if she remains on probation, there is the chance that she will be sent home to disgrace. Here, her life has meaning, and she finds that she doesn't ever want to leave.

"Everybody reports that you are competent, polite and that you work very hard. Everyone comments on your reserve."

Kitty nods. "Being unreserved is what put me on probation in the first place, Matron."

"So you're biting your tongue?"

More like chewing on it to keep it still and refrain from saying anything that could be considered defiant. Though, luckily, Nurse Jesmond is not the type to say riling things that make her hackles rise.

"I'm grateful for the second chance," she says, and it's true. She is grateful – to Mulloy for accosting her, even, for without him she'd be in England by now.

"Well, apart from constantly finding you prowling around at night, your conduct is satisfactory. I'm signing off your probation."

Relief wells in Kitty like a dry spring suddenly bursting into life. Probation is over – no more constant watching herself and making sure that she's deferential and monitoring everything she does and says.

"Thank you," she says, almost starting to rise, but there is something in Matron's expression that makes her stop. "Was there anything else?"

"Miss Trevelyan," Matron hesitates for a second. "You are aware that I have to read all outgoing women's letters?"

The shock hits Kitty like a punch to the stomach. She sags slightly against the back of the chair. She thought no-one would ever find out that she…that she…Matron is waiting for a reply, and she forces her jagged emotions together. "I thought it was random."

"All letters. And I have to read each one thoroughly."

"I…I see. In…in training, we were taught that is was only for the purposes of censorship. Nothing else. No need to discuss."

"But I do think that there is a need." Somehow, Matron's usual metal-tipped glance has softened slightly. "All confidences are kept, but…am I to understand there's a child?"

Pain rips through Kitty and Sylvie's wide brown eyes stare up at her out of a memory. _Mama, look, I drew you a picture. It's you and me, see, in our castle. You're the blue queen and I'm the pink princess – do you like our dresses?_

Tears blur in Kitty's vision and she twists her hands in her lap, desperately grasping for control.

"Such a forcible separation must be hard for you both," Matron continues, her voice quieter, almost gentle as though she understands. "It certainly explains why you don't sleep."

"I would really rather not talk," Kitty manages to choke out, pushing the memories back into their locked box in the back of her mind.

"No woman is a blank sheet of paper, we all have histories. And I'm not about to start clawing yours apart. It's the here and now that concerns me. In your letters, you ask for forgiveness."

"Call a spade a spade – I don't ask, I _beg._"

"What are you going to do if forgiveness doesn't come?"

The question makes pain flare deep in her chest. If forgiveness doesn't come? If her mother doesn't remonstrate with Elliott, doesn't let Kitty see her daughter ever again? She hasn't even considered the possibility.

"It has to," she says, aghast. Surely her mother will take her side against Elliott's, surely? She is her mother's own flesh-and-blood, surely her brother has told her what Elliott did to Kitty over their seven years of marriage? Her mouth opens and closes for a second, then she drops her gaze and whispers, "I don't know."

"Take some time to compose yourself. That's an _order, _Miss Trevelyan. We have a busy night ahead."

She wipes away the tear that has trickled down her cheek and bolts for the door, desperate to get out, to leave the memories that Matron's questioning has re-awoken to get away…

She shuts the door behind her and leans her head against the wall for a second, taking in long, slow breaths. She will calm down, she has to calm down. After a second she straightens, smoothes her dress. She will stay in control until she has a spare minute to escape to the woods and cry. She will.

She turns to go, and _he _is standing in her way, looking uncomfortable and nervous. His arms are folded across his chest.

"Miss Trevelyan," he says. "Yesterday morning when you came to get me, I was sharp."

"It doesn't matter," Kitty says, trying to step around him. He doesn't let her.

"My patient died – well, you could see that – he started bleeding and there was nothing I could do to stop it, so I snapped. I was rude."

"As I said, it doesn't matter. I'm really sorry about your patient. Can I get past please?"

He reluctantly steps to one side and it's not until she's halfway down the boardwalk that he calls after her, sounding faintly irritated. "You know, most people have the good grace to accept their apology when they're owed one!"

Her voice wobbles more than she would like it to when she half-turns to face him. "You don't owe me anything, Captain. And you haven't actually apologised."

* * *

**A/N **So, lots of people have asked for this one, so enjoy! Thank you very much to FieldFan for reviewing - I'm glad you're enjoying this!

Reviews make me smile, so press that little button at the bottom of the page! :)


	13. Fallen Girls

**XIII. Fallen Girls**

After seeing Private Byeford onto the truck back to the Front, Kitty walks slowly towards the canteen for the dinner. The daft young man of whom she'd grown rather fond had tried half-heartedly to convince her to run away with him, to which she'd responded with a laugh and a good-luck. He'd even tried to flirt with Nurse Jesmond, the cheeky devil, though she couldn't help but feel sorry for him when Mrs Crecy tried to _pay _him for his services to her husband. Kitty still can't get over how angry she was when she witnessed that little conversation.

Dinner is a quiet affair as Flora and Rosalie have already eaten, and then she wanders back to her tent to prepare for the night's convoy, which arrives at nine. It will be a long night.

Before she reaches the fence that separates the main hospital from the women's quarters, a voice stops her in her tracks. A voice that she's come to recognise so easily over the past two weeks.

"Miss Trevelyan…"

"I need to go and get ready for the convoy," she says quickly. She doesn't want to get caught up.

"I only wanted to apologise properly. I'm sorry for shouting at you yesterday, and it won't happen again."

She turns, and his blue eyes meet hers, glinting in the half-light like the sapphire pendant that she used to own before she pawned it to pay rent during her training.

"Alright," she says, suddenly feeling very heavy. "I accept your apology, Captain. Thank you."

A ghost of a smile appears on his face and he nods, before turning and walking away. She watches him go for a second, then ducks into the tent.

* * *

"Kitty, will you help me with my hair?" Flora asks, sitting down on Kitty's bed and proffering a hairbrush.

Kitty smiles and nods, taking it and running it through Flora's long, brown-auburn hair. She used to do this for Sylvie, and put it up in little plaits…no, don't think, don't think. Rosalie stands by her bed, fiddling with her cuffs.

"Our first convoy, any moment now," Flora says. "Are you nervous, Rosalie?"

"Not at all," Rosalie leans over to her upturned-crate-bedside-table and takes a letter.

"I can't believe you're only just opening that," Flora says. "If it were me I would have ripped it open the minute I received it."

"I wanted to save it," Rosalie unfolds the letter and begins to read.

"Who's it from?"

"A friend of mine, Miss Tilletson."

"How do you know her?"

"Oh Flora, stop being so nosy," Kitty chides, but Rosalie offers her a smile.

"My friend Miss Tilletson is the patroness of a home for fallen girls. I used to do some work with her."

Kitty starts pinning Flora's hair up and Flora looks dreamily into the distance. "I'd love to be a fallen girl. All you've ever been told not to do swept away by love. So romantic."

"No, it's not." Rosalie snaps, and Kitty can't help but agree with her. Romance is fine for the start, but then what happens, once you're discovered? "The girls are to be pitied, not admired. There's always a baby no-one wants. Men are beasts and well, women, morality resides in us."

Well. Perhaps from Rosalie's sheltered view of the world. But women make mistakes too, and what happens when they fall from the pillar of morality? Shunned, despised, shamed, all because they are not allowed to do what men do without even thinking about.

"And are they raised?" The words are out of Kitty's mouth before she can stop them.

"I beg your pardon?"

"The fallen girls. Are they raised?" Well, she's started now. There's no point in turning tail and running.

"With a great deal of hard work, some are placed in service in suitable houses. Some, of course, are beyond help. What point are you trying to make, Kitty?" Rosalie's tone has turned defensive.

"I wasn't making any point. It was just a question."

Rosalie looks at her for a second as if she can strip away the cloak of lies Kitty has wrapped herself in, then turns away. Kitty puts the last pin in Flora's hair and stands. "All done. I'm going, now. I'll see you later."

* * *

**A/N **Thank you for the reviews, guys - we're over the fifty mark! That's _really _exciting! Anyway, several people asked for this scene again and voila - here it is! :) Enjoy! N xx


	14. Convoy

**XIV. Convoy**

As the evening draws on and darkness falls like a blanket over the hospital, nerves begin to fray. Matron bustles about, ordering people here and there and Sister Quayle is no better. The three volunteers run from side to side, making more beds, sorting bandages, preparing. Rosalie and Flora have been assigned to Joan's ward, and Kitty is with Nurse Jesmond.

With half an hour to go, everyone is on knife edge.

"Go and get some fresh air," Nurse Jesmond tells her. "You won't be getting any till tomorrow morning after this."

"Thank you," Kitty says, ducking into the cool night. The ground is muddy, and her boots squelch as she walks out towards the picnic benches, pulling out a cigarette and lighting it. It will be fine. She's just got to do her job, make beds, do blanket-baths, and take temperature and pulse for each man. Technically, she's not supposed to be doing the last three, but since Sister Quayle is on another ward and Nurse Jesmond only has Kitty and three orderlies in a tent that can hold up to fifty patients, she needs all the help she can get.

"What are you doing all alone out here in the dark?" A figure appears out of the gloom. Miles, with a golf-club of all things swung casually over his shoulder. He doesn't have a coat on, and Kitty can't believe he's not cold.

She lifts her cigarette in answer and his face falls. There is a teasing glint in his eye. "Ah, and here I was, hoping that you were waiting to pounce on me. Do you play?"

He pretends to hit an invisible golf ball from the grass and she rolls her eyes. "I can't think of anything more futile than golf."

"That's the beauty of it. And played at night, it becomes even more futile."

There is a sound of a bell echoing and Kitty stands. Ten minutes. "I have to go."

"You know, I can't help thinking we've got off on the wrong foot. I'm not going to give up, you know."

She turns back, raising her eyebrows. Finally, a chance to discover what on earth his attempts at flirting are all about. "Captain Hesketh-Thorne, I don't understand what you want from me."

She can't help but feel nervous as she awaits his answer.

"I want you to smile."

Nothing harmful then, thank God. "Why?"

"Because life is a glorious thing. Because I can get a smile out of Matron. I can even get a smile out of Captain Gillan and this is a red rag to a bull. I will not give up until I see a smile."

The trumpets begin to sound, then, and she begins to walk away.

"Miss Trevelyan," he calls after her retreating back. "That was almost a conversation. We're making progress."

* * *

When she reaches the ward tent, Nurse Jesmond immediately sends her to the quartermasters for more supplies – just in case – and hands her an apron to tie over her uniform. Everyone is busier than before, rushing around like frenetic ants, and the air feels thick enough to cut with a knife.

With five minutes to go, she is ushered into the waiting group of nurses by Nurse Jesmond. "Find a man and help him in," she says, before hurrying to stand in line with the rest of the higher ranks. Kitty looks over at Flora and Rosalie – Flora is silent, for once, and Rosalie's face is white and set and she's chewing on her lip.

Nerves roil in Kitty's stomach like the water in the big cooking pot the cooks make the porridge in, and she almost feels sick, but she forces herself to stand straight and stare into the night. Then there is a rattle of wheels on road and the first truck lumbers through the gates.

After that, there is no time to think.

Those who cannot walk are carried in on stretchers by the orderlies. Kitty takes the arms of two of the walking wounded, one with a bloodied bandage over his eyes and the other limping on swollen feet, helping them gently through the ward doors and onto beds.

Wash, change, pulse, temperature, next man.

"More beds, on the floor," Nurse Jesmond appears at one point during the night, her apron bloodied and face harried. Kitty takes linen, begins spreading it over the canvas and helping more men down.

Wash, change, pulse, temperature, next man.

Nurse Jesmond is outside again and orderlies have all disappeared when one man suddenly screams "Nurse!"

She leaves the man she was washing and hurries over. He is doubled over and blood is streaming across his muddied uniform. She can see his pale intestines through a gash in fabric and skin. She feels sick, but she forces it back down. She can't let the man see her fear.

"It's alright, it's alright," she says quickly. "We're going to get you to theatre, just breathe. Breathe for me."

At that moment, one of the orderlies re-appears and she gestures wildly. "Take him to theatre. I have to stay here."

Then the man is gone and she's turning back to the next filthy soldier, washing and changing and pulse and temperature. The one after that has half of his face blown off and he moans pitifully as she sponges the dirt from his skin.

It is well into the mid-morning by the time the flood of men entering the ward has stopped and Nurse Jesmond re-appears. She looks over the ward, the men – mostly clean – lying on beds and on pillows on the floor and Kitty and the two of the orderlies standing in the middle of it all, bloodied and exhausted and triumphant.

After the raging night, there is just calm and quiet. Even the injured are silent, fast asleep or staring into space.

"Good work," Nurse Jesmond says. "Trevelyan, you go and get the tea trolley from the mess, then you can go back to your tent and rest."

Kitty nods numbly, and steps over patients to the door where the cool breeze washes over her flushed face like a caress. Several patients who were from before the convoy sit outside the mess, keeping out of the way and she almost stumbles as she pulls aside the flap. "One of the tea trolleys, please," she says.

Last night she saw more human suffering than she could have ever had nightmares about. How could people inflict so much pain on each other?

One of the cooks pulls a trolley towards her and she takes the handles, grateful for something to hold on to as she pushes it down the boardwalk. As she passes the operating theatre, the tent flaps fall open and Captain Gillan walks out, almost bumping into her. There is blood soaking into his apron and deep circles under his eyes.

"Tea?" she asks, before she can stop herself.

He blinks and looks at her for a second. "Thank you."

And right out there, on the boardwalk, she pours a cup of tea and hands it to him. He nods thankfully and goes on his way, and she pushes the trolley into the ward tent. She makes up several cups and leaves them for Nurse Jesmond and the orderlies, stepping back outside and wearily making her way to her tent.

"Rosalie? Flora?" she asks as she enters but stops immediately. They're both fast asleep.

* * *

**A/N **Reviews and requests are my inspiration, so please keep reviewing! I'd love to hear from all of you who are reading this story! Next chapter holds a significant moment in the Kitmas relationship, so I hate to say this, but the more reviews I get, the quicker I'll post it. N xxx.


	15. The Afternoon (You're Dead to Me)

**XV. The Afternoon (You're Dead to Me)**

That afternoon, everything has returned to normal. After a quick nap and a change of uniform, Kitty is back in the laundry, steaming and rolling bandages. Luckily, it is work that does not need much concentration.

"Letter for you, Miss." The postman appears around the corner, and her heart begins to beat a frantic pattern, the tiredness evaporating into thin air. This is it. This is what she's been waiting for.

"Thank you, oh, thank you," she says, running to take it from him and not caring if she's spotted by Matron or Sister Quayle running in uniform. She runs her hands over it, feeling the smooth paper, the edges of the stamp curling up against her fingertips. This is it. This is her ticket back into her daughter's life.

She rips it open, pulling out the single folded sheet of paper and whispering a silent prayer to the God she turned her back on six years ago. She begins to read for a moment, her heart stops.

_I gave you everything and look how you repaid me. You went with that man and left your lawfully wedded husband, and now we are a laughing-stock. The family with the daughter who broke her vows and ran off to France. You do not deserve to be a mother to Sylvie – from now on, her mother is dead of influenza, and you will not come near us again. _

_I will never, never forgive you._

_You are dead to me._

No. No, this is not how it's supposed to be. No, no, this has to be the wrong letter, it has to be to another Catherine Trevelyan, it has to…it…the world recedes around her for a second and she grips the pole holding the washing-roof up, taking shallow, gasping breaths. This is not happening, no it's not, surely this is a dream and her mother's forgiveness will come and she'll be able to see Sylvie again and…

Her daughter's voice echoes around her mind and she can't breathe and then the dam breaks and she begins to cry. There is no God, she was right. No God, and nothing she can do to get her daughter back.

Wiping away her tears, she stumbles away from the laundry, pushing aside the bracken and the leaves and hoping that no-one will notice where she's gone so she can cry and cry and let it all out and…

There is someone sitting on a rock up ahead, with her back to Kitty. Mouse-coloured hair, a purple wrap. Mrs Crecy.

Kitty has heard what the Major did to himself, in the middle of the convoy when no-one could stop him. Smashed his legs until he began bleeding uncontrollably. He was just going into theatre when she was sent to the laundry.

"How is he?" she asks, bottling up her emotions.

Mrs Crecy starts, turns to look at her. "You know what he did?"

"That he was bleeding."

"He did it deliberately."

"He's alive."

"I sent away a giant of a man. The children used to climb on his shoulders with their hands in his hair." Mrs Crecy begins to sob. "And this is what I get back."

"What did you think it was going to be?" Kitty can't bring herself to be unkind – she mustn't lash out at others because of the letter, but she can't help letting her irritation show. After all that she's done and seen, she knows Mrs Crecy should be grateful that she has her husband back at all.

"Not this! Not a ghost with a head full of horrors! He would rather be dead in the mud with his men than at home with me!"

"But he is coming home with you. You should be in there with him, not out here."

"I can't. I can't do this. I'm not prepared for this." Her earrings swing wildly as she rocks back and forth, catching the weak sunlight that filters through the trees. "Everything is over."

Kitty makes a decision, in that instant, one that she can't quite decide whether it's right or wrong, but she'll be damned if she lets Mrs Crecy walk away and leave her husband when he needs her the most. "Read it," she says, approaching the weeping woman and holding out her letter. "This is from my mother."

Mrs Crecy takes it with shaking hands. "Can you see what she says? I'm dead to her. She says I'll never see my daughter again."

Kitty snatches it away and balls it up, throwing the venomous words and crumpled paper to the floor and turning to face Mrs Crecy with her hands on her hips. "There are people who won't get back any part of their sons and their brothers and their husbands. They won't get back anything from the life before. But you have children, a home. You have so much more than most. You're wanted, you're needed. Everything is not over."

Mrs Crecy raises her eyes to Kitty's for a second, and there is suddenly a new resolve in their watery depths. "Alright," she murmurs after a long while. She stands, shaking slightly. "Would you be as kind to take me to the officers' ward?"

Kitty nods, and turns so as not to betray her feelings. If only she could have that for herself – a home, children, a husband who loved her and didn't just use her for his sick games. But there is some pride in piecing together this broken marriage, and at least two people will be happy because of her actions.

At least.

* * *

It is late in the afternoon, and she is standing outside Matron's office, watching Mrs Crecy get into the car. She doesn't know what went on between her and her husband, but she knows they've reconciled. And that's enough.

"Did you get the news you were waiting for, Miss Trevelyan?" Matron appears in front of her and Kitty blinks, brought back down to earth.

"Far from it," she murmurs. Matron has a right to know.

There is an infinitesimal softening in Matron's expression. "Then do your job."

"Yes, Matron."

She turns to go, but Matron stops her suddenly. "Just remember, the work saves us."

And then she's gone into her office and Kitty is left wondering what on earth she means.

* * *

It is evening and the sun is low in the horizon when her shift finishes. As she walks back towards her tent, she has a sudden urge to feel the salty sea breeze on her face and she turns around, heading back out through the woods to the dunes and down onto the beach proper. The damp golden sand crunches below her footsteps and the wind whips strands of hair around her face.

She holds the crumpled letter tightly in her hands. She'll never see her daughter again, but she has her work. It's a bad exchange, but it will keep her sane, at least, for now.

She rips up the letter into tiny little pieces and lets them go, watching them fly on the wind like tiny white butterflies. Then she takes a deep breath. Her mother's words can't hurt her anymore.

Another breath, in and out. The sea beckons to her, the murky waves tipped with white foam crashing against the beach and before she realises what she's doing, she's began to undo the buttons of her uniform, and then it's sliding down her body and she's running into the sea in her corset, shift and stockings.

"Shit!" she swears as the freezing water touches her legs in what is almost pain, but after a few minutes she begins to splash and laugh and remember that time that she took Sylvie to the beach just the two of them when Sylvie had started to walk. Sylvie had been fascinated by the waves at first, stumbling down to the water's edge and whenever one broke she would come toddling up the beach crying, "Oh dear, oh dear."

Kitty remembers teaching her how to swim at age four and they would splash like this and laugh. At age six – their last trip away – Sylvie had been so daring and almost given Kitty a heart attack by swimming out further than anyone else had dared to go. She would so love to see her daughter playing on the rocks and hunting for strange creatures in the rock pools, asking, "Mama what's _that_?" when a crab scuttled across the seaweed in front of her, clicking its claws menacingly.

No, she'd never get to do that with Sylvie now, but she can do it here, swim and hunt for monsters on the rocks, and joy at her escape from Elliott overcomes her as she begins to kick water up with her legs, shrieking as the coldness swells over her shoulders.

In the end, she turns and _he _is there, Captain Gillan, holding her clothes and looking so completely stunned that it borders on funny. She begins to walk towards him out of the sea, so aware of the way her corset and shift cling and her hair hangs limply, already drying crusty with salt.

As she approaches him, he looks down. There's a blush rising on his neck and she almost laughs, instead holding out her hand imperiously for her clothes. He gives them to her and there is a warmth as their fingers brush, a warmth that spreads up her arm as she begins to walk away.

This time, though, she looks over her shoulder.

He is watching her as she goes.

* * *

He can't quite believe what he just saw. Miss Trevelyan – the haughty one, the cold one – laughing and shrieking in the waves like a little child. And the way she walked up to him, so defiantly as though he would tell her off for being underdressed or being out on the beach in the first place.

He can't help but think about the way her shift billowed, the amusement in her eyes when she saw the blush.

He has to stop thinking about her, or it'll drive him mad.

But maybe mad is what he wants, after his poor, ordered life at home in Scotland and then here in the military.

He turns to go back, and her footprints are in the sand, a long trail of depressions in the gold. Unconsciously, he walks alongside them still turning over the scene in his mind.

When the soldiers come out onto the beach to play football the next day, they look at the two lines of footprints so close together as though they were made by a couple walking hand-in-hand on a romantic stroll.

Then they turn back to their game, and it is all forgotten.

* * *

**A/N **Well, this is the scene you've all been waiting for! Thank you for the reviews - and thank you very much to 'anon' - yes, the Carrel-Dakin system will appearing next chapter. And also, it's very exciting, I'm learning The Long Long Trail on the piano - the one the girls sing in episode 5, which I'm very happy about. So, on with the chapter! Enjoy! Nxx.


	16. Yelland

**XVI. Yelland**

The next day when Thomas is passing Colonel Brett's office, the door opens and the Colonel exits, followed by a slightly younger man with pale eyes and an irritating know-it-all expression plastered across his face.

"Gillan!" The Colonel calls, beckoning him over. Thomas turns and stops before him. "I'd like you to meet Major Yelland; he's starting here tomorrow. Yelland, this is one of our most promising surgeons, Captain Thomas Gillan."

"Pleasure," Thomas says shortly.

"Would you be as kind as to show Major Yelland to the sleeping sites and introduce him to a few of the others?"

"Yes, sir," Thomas says, annoyed at the interruption. A new piece of equipment from Johnson & Johnson in America is arriving at any moment now on the post truck and he wants to be there to collect it and begin setting it up before his morning operations.

"Thank you," Colonel Brett goes back into his office and Major Yelland steps down from the veranda.

"You a Scottish boy, then?"

"Yes," Thomas mutters.

"Sir," the Major adds.

"Sir." Thomas begins to walk away, bothered by the man's pompous tone and posh, drawling accent. Yelland follows him.

"So where from in Scotland?"

"Glasgow, sir." He's never been particularly comfortable discussing his roots – not that he's ashamed of being from the tenements at all, but it's not something he wants to share with such a pretentious git as this new addition is already proving himself to be.

Thomas leads him through the maze of tents, passing his and Miles' on the way. As they walk past, Miles pops his head out from his side of the tent. "Tom? Thought you were getting that piece of equipment…who's this?"

"Major Theodore Yelland." The man sticks out his chest like some kind of parrot and shoulders Thomas aside.

"Good to meet you," Miles shakes hands with the new Major. When he turns away, Miles raises his eyebrows at Thomas who responds with a frown that furrows his brow.

"Where's my tent, then?"

"I'll show you," Miles jumps in quickly before Thomas can. "The post-truck's due any second now, Tom; you might want to go before Soper gets his hands on it."

"Thank you," Thomas says and begins to walk away. As he leaves, he hears an unsavoury comment from Yelland but chooses to ignore it, knowing that Miles will stand up for him.

As Miles predicted, the post-truck is lumbering into the quad like a great khaki beetle at the exact moment that he gets past Colonel Brett's office. The door opens again and the Colonel pokes his head out. "Where Yelland?"

"Captain Hesketh-Thorne is showing him to his tent, sir. The Carrel-Dakin system is arriving today." He nods to the truck.

"Very good. Send someone to fetch me when you've set it all up."

* * *

"He's a git," Miles says as Thomas re-enters the tent that evening, tired but pleased at his success in getting the system set up over one of the beds in the intensive ward. The solution is easy to make and with the help of Corporal Foley, the large wooden frame with the sling for the wound took no time to assemble. He wonders whether this is what an architect feels when some grand palace is just starting to take shape.

"My thoughts exactly," he replies, sitting down in his chair and pulling his typewriter towards him.

"Kept wanting to know who the best surgeon was or which nurse had been most blessed by Venus. I had to remind him at least three times that military nurses aren't allowed to marry – at least he hasn't realised that we have our very own voluntary aid detachment. On that subject, I almost got a smile out of Miss Trevelyan this morning; I could see the corners of her lips twitching, but she still manages to remain impervious. I don't see why…"

"Perhaps you should give up on her."

"No. Not until I see a smile. I made a wager…"

"That wager went null weeks ago, Miles."

"I made a wager and I will see her smile."

"Have it your way." He knows that Miles' flirting is harmless and there is no way that Miss Trevelyan will crack. Not for Miles. But he can't help remembering that half smile that graced her lips as she turned, barely dressed from the sea and the way she walked up to him as though she was a queen, haughty, imperious.

"Tom!"

"Yes?" he starts, jerked out of his thoughts like a fish on the end of a rod. "Yes, sorry?"

Miles rolls his eyes good-naturedly, "I had the manners to inquire as to your new piece of equipment, but you weren't listening. Did Colonel Brett approve?"

"He said we would have to wait for a patient with the right kind of wound to merit using it, but that if it worked it would mean less amputations and more men spending the rest of their lives on two legs instead of one."

"I like the sound of that, my friend. Now, my stomach is rumbling and the mess tent is calling."

"I'll be along in a minute."

"Alright." Miles ducks out of the tent just as Yelland comes wandering along, followed by two of the other surgeons.

"Ah, going to the mess. I could do with a decent feed – is it any good?"

Thomas winces at the grating of his voice, and says a silent prayer that Yelland won't notice him. He doesn't have the patience that Miles does when it comes to dealing with obnoxious prats.

Luckily, it seems, God is listening and the Major passes on his way with Miles sending a pointed look in Thomas' direction before the little group disappear into the gathering gloom.

* * *

If anything, it irritates Miles more than it irritates him. Major Yelland's comments are inoffensive – most of the time – and the idiot doesn't seem to understand that Thomas doesn't care that his social rank is below that of all the other surgeons here. He doesn't know how on earth the Major found out he was from Gorbals, in the tenements, but it doesn't particularly matter.

But that, of course, all changes from the moment when Yelland realises the little jabs don't rile him.

He is coming out of the operating theatre after a successful surgery when he hears that noxious voice floating around the corner of the tent like poisonous gas.

"Of course, he's got such a chip on his shoulder that he won't ask for help. Those kinds of men are all the same."

There's no doubt that Yelland is referring to him, and he takes in a slow, controlled breath to keep himself from turning the corner and punching Yelland so hard his…breathe.

There were kids like this back in Glasgow, who looked down on him and sneered for wanting to make a better life for himself, to not just work in factories until his spine cricked and his eyes were cloudy. But once he proved he was just as tough and strong as they were, they left him alone.

It won't work like that with Yelland. He knows that, and the best policy now is to ignore him. Just ignore him.

* * *

It is a few days later when they bring in another cart-load of wounded soldiers, bloodied, dirtied and shaking. One of them has an open, infected wound in his leg and Thomas sees his opportunity.

But then, Yelland starts to interfere.

He is nearing the end of his morning rounds, and heading towards the intensive unit to see if the Carrel-Dakin unit has been doing any good to the infection on the man's leg. As he reaches the ward door, one of the patients with bandages swathed across his head stumbles out, fingers scratching under the cloth furiously.

One of the nurses – Nurse Burke – chases after him. "Corporal Winfield, come back inside."

"These thieving little devils are in my trees again, bloody little devils…"

"Come on," Thomas puts a hand on the man's shoulder and pushes him back towards the doorway. Nurse Burke follows.

"There is no-one stealing anything, now back into bed this instant."

Once he has helped Nurse Burke get Winfield back into his bed and sedated, he turns towards where the young soldier is lying, his leg elevated in the sling that came with the equipment. The wound is still open, and he knows that it is painful for the patient, but after only two irrigations with the solution, the infection seems to be clearing up.

Until now, that is.

He bends over to examine the wound. Yellow pus, dripping out and mixing with the blood and swelling all around the boy's thigh. His forehead is sweating.

"Christ," Thomas swears, straightening up abruptly and turning to Nurse Burke, who is hovering at the foot of the bed. "This wound needs to be irrigated every two hours, otherwise it gets infected. It hasn't been done and now the wound is infected again. Why hasn't it been done?"

He glares at her and she purses her lips together. "Major Yelland said to let the patient sleep, Captain."

A tide of thick, red-hot anger swells over him and for a second his vision wobbles at the strength of it. Damn Yelland – were the constant criticisms and jabs not enough? Damn the bastard to the depths of hell where he belongs.

Thomas snatches the clipboard from the wall by the patient's bed, holding it in front of Nurse Burke and tapping the name at the top. "Is this Major Yelland's name?"

"He's the senior officer…"

Thomas silences her with an icy glare and she looks down. "We just do what we're told to…"

"No, you don't and that is the problem." He shoves the clipboard into the nurse's hand. "Get him ready for surgery."

He doesn't hear the patient's plea as he storms down the ward and out into the cool, fresh air. After a moment, he senses rather than sees Miles coming down the boardwalk towards him and he turns towards his friend, pinching the bridge of his nose in an effort to distract himself from the fury throbbing at his temples.

"I'm going to kill Yelland."

"I'll help you dig the grave and then it'll be our secret," Miles stops next to him. "What did he do? Not more of those stupid bloody comments…"

"He's tampering with the Carrel-Dakin system and has told the nurse to leave out the last irrigations and _guess what_? The wound's infected again and I have to do more surgery on the poor boy who should have been almost healed by now."

"Ah."

"Yes, ah. I'm going to bloody well kill him, and leave him out to rot for the crows."

"I'm not going to stop you. But make sure you calm down before you go into theatre – you don't want to be making any mistakes because you're angry."

"I know. Thank you, Miles."

"No problem. I need to be on the ward in any second now…"

Thomas steps aside and tips his head back for a second, letting the gentle breeze blow across his face, before he turns and heads for the supplies hut to find the right instruments.

* * *

**A/N **I have to thank TheCurlyMop very much for this chapter, as she is just full of great ideas about how to write our favourite little obnoxious git! If anyone needs any help writing Yelland, she should be your first port of call! ;) Thank you to everyone who reviewed - enjoy! N xx


	17. Experiment

**XVII. Experiment**

"Go and re-fill this for my dressing round," Nurse Jesmond instructs. "If Sister Quayle's not around and there's nothing else that needs doing, you can observe me and practise a bit."

"Yes, Nurse Jesmond," Kitty says, taking the trolley from where it is parked near the entrance of the tent. But taking it across the hospital when the ground is just becoming slick with fallen leaves and autumn's mud is easier said than done, and by the time she's elbowing the door of the supply room open, her arms are screaming with the effort.

And then the idiotic trolley gets caught on the step. "Come on," she growls at it, pulling up with all her might and all but tumbling through the door. It's only when she's pushing it across the room to fill it up with the right kinds of bandages that she notices that there's someone else in there. And not just any someone – him. _Oh damn it. _

"I'm sorry, I didn't realise that anyone else was in here," she says, but he has already turned away, gone back to his clipboard. Why bother? If he's going to pretend that the incident on the beach didn't nag at him as much as it does at her – if she doesn't forget about the shock in his blue, blue eyes and the blush that rose up the back of his neck like an endearing tide then she will go _mad_ – then there's no point trying to talk to him at all. If he's going to be like this, she's just going to pretend it never happened. She's good at doing that, nowadays.

But then the thought hits her that anyone else could have reported her for indecent conduct, and she would have been back on a Blighty convoy before she could blink. Warring with herself for a second, she takes a shallow breath and turns towards his back.

"I…I don't quite know how to say this, but I'm going to say it anyway. I wasn't supposed to be on the beach, let alone swimming and anyone else might have reported me or gossiped and I would be in England by now. Since I'm not, I've assumed that you've done neither and…well, I just want to say thank you."

He doesn't even look at her.

When the door bangs shut behind him, she is surprised at how much it hurts.

* * *

But Yelland doesn't stop there. Halfway through the operation, he shoulders his way into the operating theatre. "Christ, are you still experimenting on this poor blighter?"

He strides to the other side of the table, snatching Thomas' blood-stained scalpel from his hands and bending over the wound. "What a mess. Re-infected, stinks like an open grave. I bet you'd prefer a nice, clean stump, wouldn't you? Of course he would – you're like a bloody torturer, Gillan. I suppose that this is the sort of backstreet butchery that passes for surgery where you come from, eh?"

"You're in my light, _sir,_" Thomas says as evenly as he can manage. How dare he come into an operation that should have been finished by now! How dare he insult Thomas so broadly in front of the patient and the three orderlies when Thomas is _trying to get rid of the infection that Yelland caused in the first place! _

Yelland slowly straightens up and looks at Thomas very slowly for a second, hatred and something else roiling in the depths of his pale eyes before turning away. "Bloody amateurs."

Thomas fights back a retort, takes a clean scalpel from one of the orderlies and begins to work again.

* * *

After observing Nurse Jesmond's dressing round and being allowed to re-bandage one of the men's stumps, Kitty is sent off to the store-room again for iodine and fresh bandages and told to report with them to a Nurse Burke in the intensive ward.

She is just walking along the boardwalk with the weak autumnal sunshine glinting in her eyes and her bucket swinging from her fingertips when Miles appears behind her. "Miss Trevelyan, I'm still waiting for that smile."

She turns her head to look at him and raises an eyebrow. "You do know what they say about banging your head against a brick wall? It feels absolutely wonderful when you stop."

He isn't deterred in the slightest, and she muses on what might actually put him off from the constant flirting. If he stopped with it, then he might be rather decent company. "Then my head must be made for brick walls, because I always feel pretty wonderful."

She snorts and turns off towards the intensive ward, a neat, soundly built hut with a porch. She lets herself in quietly and puts the supplies on the trolley at the end. Two orderlies are just laying a grey-faced young man back onto his bed – one with a strange-looking contraption constructed over it rather like a child's swing – and hoisting an injured leg back into an elevated sling. Halfway through the process he loses consciousness and lies splayed like a doll a little girl has thrown down in disgust.

"Ah, you must be Miss Trevelyan." A nurse – Nurse Burke, Kitty assumes – is approaching, managing a smile. There are deep circles drawn under her eyes. "Come with me."

She leads Kitty to a bed at the far end where a man is sitting, blood-stained bandages wound around his head and a glazed expression in his eyes, twisting his fingers together. "He's always getting out of his bed and I've got too much to do to be constantly going to retrieve him. If you could just steer him back and try to make sure he doesn't scratch his head…"

"I'll try my best," Kitty says.

"You're a brick," Nurse Burke smiles, turning back towards the other end of the ward.

Then there is the sound of that young man, woken up, protesting about something loudly. Nurse Burke takes a step towards the bed, and Captain Gillan – when did he come in? – appears from behind the screen. "I don't care who walks on this ward, be it Major Yelland or God Almighty – this wound is to be irrigated every two hours!" He points an accusing finger at Nurse Burke and strides off.

"Bastard, you bastard," the young man shouts after his retreating back, but he doesn't turn and Kitty stares for a second, before looking back at the man she's been tasked to watch. It's none of her business, it really isn't but…Captain Gillan's got a heart, she knows he has – why is he letting this poor boy suffer so?

She shakes her head quickly to herself. No. None of her business, she should just let it be. And so she does, looking out of the window above the man's head and linking her fingers together. It will be a long afternoon, but then she's used to it by now. At least she isn't cleaning soiled bedpans again.

* * *

**A/N **Wow, guys, seriously? 71 reviews? This is amazing - it's the most reviews I have ever got for a story before? Thank you so much! Thank you to Guest and anon as well, for reviewing, I'm glad you like this! Well, here's the next chapter. Enjoy! N xx


	18. The Mess Dinner

**XVIII. The Mess Dinner**

The best tent has been set up again, and best glasses all the way from England laid out on the tables. All the officers mill around, chatting amiably and sipping at golden champagne that shimmers in the light from the dim bulbs.

Miles raises his glass for a refill and the private serving tops it up. He grins at Thomas. "I'm going to get as much down as possible before Yelland arrives and hogs the lion's share. At least it'll make this evening slightly more bearable."

As soon as Miles mentions the name Yelland, the curtain at the other end swooshes open and the man himself stands there, chest stuck out like a pompous parrot. "Gentlemen, I am sorry to say that Colonel Brett is indisposed tonight, so I will be in the chair."

"Wonderful," Miles mutters under his breath. "Can't we just go somewhere else and get blind stinking drunk?"

"Gillan, from the outside in," Yelland calls obnoxiously across the chatter of men finding their places and sitting down.

"Last chance," Miles whispers.

"No, we're going to stay here," Thomas murmurs back, pulling his chair out and sitting down. He's come to a conclusion over the past few days; the way he defeated the bullies in Gorbals was by showing them how tough he was. The way he'll defeat this one is by proving that he's immune to Yelland's comments and interference. And of course, that plan involves staying.

Miles sighs and takes his place beside Thomas just as the first course is borne through the tent.

* * *

Surprisingly, he manages to last the entire dinner without being picked on. But when the atmosphere becomes tinged with informality and the officers start to lounge in their chairs with cigarettes and glasses of amber-orange brandy, Yelland turns a pale, piercing gaze on Thomas.

"Are you published yet?" he asks, false saccharine dripping from every word.

"No sir," Thomas replies, taking a sip of his drink.

"Well, keep rattling away with it," Yelland regards him hatefully. "Writing about that contraption of yours."

"It's called a Carrel-Dakin system, sir," Thomas raises an eyebrow and Yelland looks down into his drink.

"Sounds like something out of Beatrix Potter." There are a couple of chuckles at this. Miles looks intensely uncomfortable, but Thomas couldn't bring himself to care less at the obvious lack of respect in his voice.

"Beatrix Potter, a little mouse wanting to be a big mouse. Call it whatever you will, it doesn't work."

"There's been some interference with it, sir."

"Well, I bet you'll sort it out. Clever chap – must be to have gotten this far." That comment rankles, and Thomas' hackles start to rise. No, _no, _he must not let Yelland get him angry – that is what the man is trying to do and his attempts must not succeed. By sheer force of willpower, he manages to stay silent and the git continues on. Miles on the other hand is rising to the bait on his behalf.

"Scholarships and what have you. Every exam another step up the ladder, shinning your way up the greasy pole."

"Christ's sake, sir," Miles speaks up, but Thomas puts a hand on his arm, a thought suddenly occurring to him that he's damned if he didn't notice it before. Yelland is _scared_ of him. Scared. Scared of the fact that Thomas is a better surgeon and a bigger success story than Yelland will ever be. That thought sends a thrill of power through him and he finally realises that Yelland is nothing more than a petulant child, pouting to get the things he wants without any work whatsoever. He shifts in his seat, fixes an implacable gaze on Yelland, who continues on regardless.

"You deserve a lot of credit. Must be strange, being addressed as 'sir' by your tribe. Tell me then, what do they all call you when you go back home to the tenement. What do 'Mum' and 'Dad' say to their blue-eyed boy now that they're his inferiors?"

Miles is tense beside him and a long, silent second passes.

Then Thomas begins to laugh. It's funny, really, now that he's realised that there is a cowardly little boy shivering behind the bravado front that Yelland puts up.

"Well, yes, it is rather funny," Yelland says, folding his arms and leaning back, pleased with himself. Everyone else is looking at Thomas like he's finally sailed clean out of his wits, and he stops laughing, arching an eyebrow at Yelland and letting all the anger dissipate into thin air as words pour out of his mouth without even thinking.

"Isn't it? You sitting there like you're God Almighty, when everyone here knows that as a man you're a waste of skin and as a surgeon, well. You couldn't find your cock with both hands if you tried. Sir."

There is a moment of utter silence when even the guns on the horizon stop firing, and then Yelland is moving, running around the table towards him. Thomas idly blows a puff of cigarette smoke across the room, and then Yelland is behind him, furious, red-faced. "On your feet," he hisses.

In a fluid instant, Thomas is up, arms outstretched. "Go on. You first. Anywhere you like."

He can tell that Yelland isn't expecting this. He can tell that Yelland doesn't realise that Thomas isn't scared of getting hurt, not since he was eight and beaten up by the bigger boys in the tenement. Came home with blood dripping down his face and his arm cradled awkwardly to his side, barely able to inhale because of the bruises patterning his ribs.

Yelland breathes through his nose for a second, holding up a finger under Thomas' nose, and that's when everyone realises that Yelland is coward because he can't face up to a fight like a real man.

Then he's gone, and Thomas is sitting down again. Miles is staring at him in horror as he absently takes a sip of his brandy. "What have you done?" he hisses once the excitement of the moment is over and everyone has gone back to their previous conversations. "Yelland'll make a complaint, and you'll be on probation before you can say jack rabbit."

"Colonel Brett doesn't like Yelland any more than the rest of us."

"Tom, it's military law. You threatened a senior officer."

"I did nothing of the sort. He was the one who was going to fight me. Just drop it, Miles. I'll get a warning, and then it will all blow over."

"I'm not so sure," Miles says uneasily. "I'm really not so sure."

* * *

It's early morning, and before Tom is even awake, Miles is sliding into his clothes and creeping out of the tent. Tom doesn't see the seriousness of the situation and Miles will be damned if he sees his friend's career as a very promising surgeon cut short because of a cowardly _git _like Yelland.

The dew glitters on the grass like jewels as he navigates his way through the maze of tents, careful not to make a sound. He's rarely up this early and he still feels heavy with sleep, but it's worth it to see the sky painted in all shades of pastel pink and gold and hear the birds chirping happily in the trees.

As he approaches the centre of the hospital, the people on night-shift are just beginning to emerge, blinking and rubbing their eyes. They're due another convoy this evening, quite a big one, and everyone will need to be on high alert. The hospital is already stretched to its limits.

There's a light burning in Colonel Brett's office and Miles stops for a second, takes a breath. If Tom isn't going to take this seriously, then Miles had better do it on his friend's behalf. He takes a slow, deep breath of cool air and knocks.

"Come in," the Colonel calls, and Miles opens the door.

"Could I have a word, Colonel?"

"Hesketh-Thorne – what a pleasant surprise to see you up so early." The Colonel stands, moving around his desk and beckoning Miles into the room. "What can I do for you?"

"I assume that Major Yelland has told you of the…incident…at last night's mess dinner, sir," Miles begins and Colonel Brett nods, his almost-good mood vanishing like the moon at the break of day.

"Yes, I have – I suppose you've come to plead on Gillan's behalf; he's a friend of yours, isn't he?"

"Yes, sir, he is. I just wanted to tell you that whilst Captain Gillan was in the wrong, Major Yelland isn't an innocent either."

"Carry on."

"Ever since he's arrived, he's been taunting Captain Gillan with remarks about his background, and then about his proficiency as a surgeon, and lately he has started to interfere with the Carrel-Dakin system, which is drawing out the healing process for the patient."

"Why didn't Captain Gillan come to me with this when it was occurring?" Colonel Brett asked, anger creasing his forehead into a frown.

"I tried to tell him to, but he wouldn't listen."

"Thank you, Hesketh-Thorne. I will take that into consideration when I deal with the issue. You are dismissed."

"Sir."

Miles turns and leaves, hoping upon hope that he's at least done something to help Thomas' case.

* * *

**A/N **Thank you for the reviews, guys - an especial thanks to Guest and anon - I'm really pleased that you are enjoying my story. Keep the requests coming in - especially now for between episodes 4 and 5! :) Enjoy! N xx.


	19. Alarmed

**XIX. Alarmed**

As expected, he is summoned to Colonel Brett's office before his morning rounds. So this is it, then. Miles isn't in the tent as Thomas dresses and leaves; perhaps he is still irritated.

Colonel Brett is standing behind his desk sorting folders as Thomas knocks and enters. There is a moment of tense, pregnant silence as he waits for the tirade to begin. The Colonel's face is set into a deep frown.

"I've had a serious complaint about you," he begins, anger under shadowing every word. "This is why I don't like mess dinners – all the educated men become bloody feral. It's not death that's the great leveller, it's drink."

"I wasn't drunk, sir," Thomas says quietly, keeping his gaze fixed on a point above the Colonel's shoulder.

"Consider this a severe reprimand. I've been told that there has been a long campaign of particular provocation."

"Who told you that?" he asks, surprised at the fact the Colonel knows. When the answer comes, the pieces fall into place.

"Your friend, the blasted boy, was up here at dawn. It's the first time I've seen him drag himself from his pit at a decent hour."

So that's why Miles wasn't in the tent. Thomas doesn't quite know whether to be grateful or cross with his friend for meddling.

"It's not an excuse, sir," he says, quietly.

"No, but it is a reason." The Colonel picks up his tea. "Major Yelland won't be around much longer; he's being moved to a casualty clearing station…"

What? How does Yelland get away with that when…Thomas opens his mouth to protest but Colonel Brett beats him to it.

"I know that this is something you want, but I'm afraid you're just going to have to wait your turn. I hope you understand that I'm completely brassed off with the whole lot of you?"

Thomas bites his tongue and nods.

"Good. Go away."

He turns towards the door, but then a thought begins to niggle at the back of his mind, and he hesitates. It feels as though in this attempt to rebuff Yelland, he's forgotten his patient, the one lying in agony because he wants to prove that the Carrel-Dakin system is the right way of doing things. But is it right? Is he right to cause someone so much pain, because however much he denies it, it is an experiment?

"Sir, am I doing the right thing with the Carrel-Dakin system?" He turns back towards the Colonel. "It's just, the man's in agony and I do feel like a torturer, but…"

"Gillan." The Colonel steps around his desk and stands in front of him, forcing Thomas to look him in the eye. "That is a very expensive piece of kit. Do you suppose that I let you make free with it, causing considerable pain to the patient, of course, because I am wracked by wild and uncontrollable doubt?"

The reassurance is there and Thomas nods. "No, sir."

"Good. Now, kindly. Bugger off and do your job."

* * *

On the list of his morning rounds, there are two new names tacked to the bottom of the list. Two privates, both in Ward 10A. He decides to go there first and get everything out of the way before he goes to speak to his patient in the intensive ward.

Sister Livesy is on duty in the ward as he enters and holds out his clipboard. "I'm looking for a Private Spinner and a Private Ashdon."

"Over here, sir," she says, leading him over. The two have been cursorily cleaned and bandaged. One is fast asleep, curled up like a small child trying to hide from the monsters under the bed. "They arrived early this morning on the truck with some others because there was no space in the clearing station. One has a fractured humerus, and the other's riddled with shrapnel."

"Thank you, Sister," he says, approaching the man sitting up on his headboard and staring into space. His arm is in a hastily constructed splint.

"Spinner, yes?" Thomas says, glancing at the clipboard above the bed and putting his own down. "I'm Captain Gillan. Let's have a look at this arm, then."

Sister Livesy comes around the other side of the bed and carefully unwraps the splint. The man hisses in pain. Thomas leans over to look at the wound. It's a mess. Swollen, still bleeding, splinters of bone all over the place from where the bullet must have hit. And as he looks closer, there are the unmistakeable signs of gas-gangrene.

"This is going to need surgery," he murmurs to Sister Livesy. "I'll see him right after the rest of my rounds at about eleven o'clock. If his temperature goes up or anything changes, send someone to find me right away."

"Yes, Captain," she nods.

After waking and seeing the other man, Ashdon, and taking out some of the shallow pieces of shrapnel, he takes off his apron, puts on his white jacket and crosses the boardwalk to the intensive hut. It's quiet, in there and at the end, he can see _her _standing at the foot of the bed.

"Where's the nurse?" he asks, cursing at how abrupt his voice sounds. Why can't he be able to act normally around her?

She's not fazed by his tone of voice – doesn't even turn to look at him but keeps her eyes focussed on the patient in the bed she's watching. "She said that she'd be back in a few minutes."

Her lack of movement, lack of expression bothers him somehow, and he's speaking before he half realises it. "Shouldn't you be doing something?"

"I am doing something," she says, so calm that it is infuriating. He can't work her out – sometimes she's trying to talk to him and he doesn't know what to say and sometimes she won't even reply. It's as though she is pretending that incident on the beach never happened; it's as though he doesn't dream about the look in her eyes or think about the sight of her looking over her shoulder defiantly every waking moment.

"It doesn't look like it."

She doesn't reply, so he lifts the clipboard, begins to scribble. _Put it out of your mind, Tom, put it out of your mind. _

* * *

She watches out of the corners of her eyes as he approaches his patient, gently shaking the young man awake. There is something different from the last time he was in here – there's a different air about him, a difference in the set of his shoulders.

"Marston," he says quietly. "Yes, this is an experiment and yes, I know it's excruciating and if you really can't bear it, I will amputate. Only if you really can't bear it."

Marston begins to speak, but she watches as Captain Gillan holds up a hand to stop him. "You're a young man, and I want to see you walk through the rest of your life on two legs, not as an amputee with a crutch. So what's it to be?"

Kitty feels so incredibly, indescribably moved by the conversation she knows she shouldn't be listening to, and she doesn't quite know how this change has come about. This man is more like the awkward, blushing young man who looked down as she walked up the beach towards him than the angry, callous surgeon who strode away without listening to his patient's pleas.

She barely hears Marston whisper, "Two legs," before Winfield begins to shift restlessly.

"Those thieving, bloody devils…"

* * *

He stands and watches as she dashes to the man's side, taking his hands. "No, no, no, I've spoken to their mothers. Those boys have been told no more climbing in your trees, no more breaking branches, no more scrumping…"

There's a feeling that he can't quite put his finger on filling his chest as he listens to her, sees the beautiful smile tugging her face wide. Somehow he always knew that she'd be even more beautiful if she smiled, and here's the proof right in front of him. He wonders what it would be like if it were him who could make her smile like that.

"They…they can have all the windfalls they like, I don't mind them having the windfalls," the pitiful figure whispers, and Miss Trevelyan squeezes his hands gently.

"I'll tell them. Now you just get some rest, then you can go and water your trees, yes?"

The patient nods and subsides back against his pillows, his eyes glazing over again. She stands and walks towards Thomas, brushing past to wash her hands. He looks back down at his clipboard, suddenly feeling very awkward. "We can't wrestle with him," she says quietly. "Just got to keep him from scratching his head. There isn't much head left to scratch, is there?"

"I don't know, he's not one of mine," Thomas says quietly, flipping over the piece of paper.

"It seems to be working." She slants him a glance, haughty again. "That's what I'm doing." There's a silent pause. "Not that it's of any concern to you," she tacks onto the end.

Her eyes meet his, and words form on the tip of his tongue. He takes a deep sigh and turns to face her, lowering his voice so the patients cannot hear. "When I saw your clothes on the beach, I thought that someone was drowning."

She rubs her hands dry on the towel. "I'm sorry if I alarmed you."

"I've been alarmed since the moment you arrived," he blurts out without thinking.

Her head whips around and her mouth falls open slightly, endearingly. She seems about to say something, but then the door creaks open and Nurse Burke re-appears alongside two orderlies with a new case. Thomas steps away from her abruptly, and she looks down at her hands, a blush rising up her cheeks.

"Captain Gillan – I wasn't expecting you for another half-hour," Nurse Burke says as the orderlies lay the patient on a freshly made-up bed.

"No, I just came to see Marston. I'm going, now."

As he leaves, he looks over his shoulder. She is watching him, something coming to the surface of her dark, dark eyes.

* * *

**A/N **Thank you to 'anon' for your lovely review!


	20. Sleep

**XX. Sleep **

That evening, another convoy arrives and again it's wash, change, pulse, temperature over and over again until she's almost dizzy, making more and more beds in the new ward tents, and blood spurting everywhere from men that are falling to pieces.

When the orderlies and Nurse Jesmond are out again, as they are constantly, there comes the inevitable, terrified scream of "Nurse!"

She runs down the aisle, stepping over men groaning on the floor to where a young boy stands, blood pouring from his leg in an uncontrollable crimson tide. "Put pressure on it," she says as she's seen Nurse Jesmond do, taking a sheet from the tray and balling it up. He hisses in agony, and she puts his arm over her slender shoulders. "We've got to get you to theatre."

At that moment, Rosalie puts her head into the door and Kitty gestures. "Rosalie, stay here. I've got to get him to the operating tent."

Before Rosalie can protest – she's still holding a grudge over that tirade Kitty had at her on their first day – she's out into the night air with the weight of the boy almost making her knees buckle. She's a nurse, she's got to do this and she cannot – will not – give up.

It feels like hours that it takes to reach the operating tent, and there are men waiting outside it on stretchers and orderlies carrying them to and fro. "Excuse me," she says, "Excuse me, he's haemorrhaging, haemorrhage coming through."

Orderlies with less serious cases part for her and then she's inside the tent, behind a man on a stretcher who's pale and still and deathly white.

It feels as though her patient has fainted on top of her, and the blood drips onto the floor, drip, drip, drip, splashes like rose petals.

"Next," someone bellows from across the room and the person in front is already being seen to and people are rushing about like panicked birds. An orderly takes her patient's other arm and they half-drag him over to the free operating table.

Blue eyes meet hers, staring out of a tired, strained face.

She barely has a moment to realise that it's Captain Gillan behind all the blood-splattered white surgical clothes and black rubber gloves before she's being ushered away with that blue glance burning into the back of her mind.

"Back to the ward, Nurse," says one of the orderlies – there are too many to learn all their names – and she's going back and into the tent where Rosalie is gone and Nurse Jesmond is taking care of a man with two blank white eyes staring out of his face and blood dribbling from behind a hastily applied field-dressing.

"Start dressing wounds," Nurse Jesmond says over her shoulder. "Quickly, before the next lot come in and need bathing."

"Yes, Nurse," Kitty says, picking up a bucket of iodine solution. She learnt this in training as well, and she's been allowed to change a few dressings under supervision, but this is the first time she's ever done it on her own.

She goes down to the opposite end of the ward from Nurse Jesmond and puts a smile on her face. This man has an open, gaping wound in his thigh and she gently bathes it before slowly, laboriously wrapping a bandage around it. Then it's onto the next man, and the next, and before she knows it several men have died and she's re-making their beds so that more filthy bloodied men can limp in and take their places.

The work goes on and on, and the next morning after fetching the tea trolley again, she heads back to her tent and falls fast asleep.

* * *

He is absolutely exhausted by the time he stumbles out of theatre that afternoon; seventeen hours of operations is enough to make anyone beg for a long, dreamless sleep, but there are reports to write and patients from before the convoy to check on and he can't allow himself to go to sleep now or he won't wake up until tomorrow morning.

He heads to the first ward and does a few checks, trying desperately to keep from yawning as he examines Private Spinner's new stump. "You'll be going home to Blighty," he tells the young man. "It's in my books, so you'll get the ticket when Colonel Brett comes around for the next convoy in a couple of days."

"Yes, sir." The young man manages a weary smile. He's in pain – that much is obvious – but they have to give morphine to only the most serious cases until more arrives from manufacturers in England and America.

"Good. Try and rest – I know it hurts, but sleep is the best medicine now."

A nod, and Thomas turns away. To the supply hut now to fill in an inventory form, and then only a few more patients before he can give in to the tender embrace of slumber. He rubs his eyes and yawns as soon as he's out of sight of the patients – it's not good for them to see him so tired – he knows he won't make mistakes, even when this exhausted, but they're not to know that and he doesn't want to panic them.

He focusses on putting one foot in front of the other, and when he gets to the supply hut, opening the door and closing it carefully, there is no-one there. For a moment, he gives into the weakness and leans his head against the wall for a second, closing his eyes.

It is a bad move. Seconds later, he's fast asleep.

* * *

She gets in a few hours of rest before she's woken by a nightmare, and, promising herself that she will have an early night tonight, she quickly dresses and slips out, careful not to wake Rosalie and Flora. There's no-one about, so she decides to re-stock the trolley on her and Nurse Jesmond's ward, then go and relieve whoever needs sleep the most as its unlikely she'll surrender to Morpheus until darkness throws a veil over the day. Not with memories burning into the back of her mind like iron brands.

She fetches the trolley from the ward where most of the patients are sleeping soundly. That's all they ever want to do when they first come in; sleep and sleep and sleep. And then eat, and sleep some more.

She pushes open the door to the supply hut and heaves the trolley over the step, only to stop dead in her tracks.

Captain Gillan is leaning against the wall, clipboard falling out of his hand, fast asleep.

She presses her lips together to keep from making a sound, watching him for a second. The stressed lines at the corners of his eyes disappear when he's asleep and he looks younger, more innocent with his eyes closed and strands of light brown hair falling across his forehead.

But she knows that he can't stay asleep, and that he is incredibly lucky that she is the one who has found him. If it were Matron, or one of the more senior officers, he would be in trouble for sure. Leaving the trolley in the centre of the room, she crosses the wooden floorboards towards him, deliberating on how to wake him.

Eventually, she settles on shaking his shoulder gently, feeling the roughness of the khaki jacket and the warmth of his arm underneath her hand. He stirs for a second, then his eyes open slowly, the blue-grey like the sky just before dawn.

She steps back, but less abruptly than she would have before. He stares at her for a second, confused.

"What…"

"You were asleep," she says gently.

He shook his head, blinking several times. "I'm sorry. I told myself I wouldn't…

"Don't worry." She looks up and lets the corner of her mouth pull in a tiny smile.

There is a long silence and he can't drag his eyes from hers. Eventually he forces himself to look away. "Thank you."

"It isn't a problem."

"No, really. Thank you," he insists.

The little smile widens slightly. "You're welcome."

Another long pause. The guns boom on the horizon. The wind begins to whistle mournfully.

"I had better get on. I'm sure Sister Quayle has an endless list of tasks for me if I presume to ask," Kitty says, beginning to load the trolley with supplies.

He nods. "I've got to finish this."

"Then you'll promise you'll get some sleep? I don't want to have to wake you up again so you don't get into trouble."

He smiles slowly. "I promise."

* * *

**A/N **Bit of cute Kitmas fluff to fill the gap of the episode tonight! Thank you _so _much for all the reviews, guys - I can't believe how many this story is getting! Thank you! N xx


	21. Meet Me

**XXI. Meet Me**

She walks slowly away from the graveside, following Flora and Rosalie who are talking quietly as they go. Another six buried in the cemetery in the nearby fields, and more pouring in every day from the ambulances that shuttle them from the hospital trains. She has taken to attending the funerals whenever she can, because usually there aren't enough people to fill even one side of a grave. But these six are officers – high-ranking ones – and this warrants as many of the surgeons and nurses as can be spared to pay their respects.

It was a simple, beautiful service, in the open air surrounded by the autumn birds chirping from the trees and swooping overhead in the cerulean sky. She can't help but be reminded of when her father died, when she was eight, but that affair was full of people in black like crows and her mother dabbing her tissue against her eyes and leaning on Kitty's older brother's arm. She had just been ignored by everyone – too young to take any notice of. Her father hadn't made much of her when he was living, so no-one particularly bothered when he was dead.

They're just queuing up at the mess for breakfast when a very familiar voice speaks next to her ear. "Do you have free time this afternoon?"

"We all do," she says quietly, making sure that none of the soldiers who are going back up the line tonight can hear her.

Over the past two weeks with a large number of men coming in with trench-fever: headaches, rashes, stabbing pains and between nursing them, being on the wards, looking after the surgical patients and running around doing Sister Quayle's bidding – if anything, she has become even more irritating than usual to everyone except Rosalie – Kitty has had to content herself with secret half-smiles across the mess and bumping into Captain Gillan 'accidentally' in the store cupboard. Though he's insisting that Captain Gillan is too formal – his Christian name is Thomas though she already knows that from hearing Miles call for him across the hospital.

"But do you have any plans?" His warm breath tickles her ear slightly, and she looks around as though she's not talking to him at all.

When she's sure no-one who might be interested is looking, she whispers back, "I thought I could tidy the tent a bit, perhaps do some darning."

She risks a glance over her shoulder at him, and he half-laughs, half-snorts.

"Would you meet me?"

Her heart leaps into her mouth. She knows she shouldn't encourage him – she knows that she's still damaged goods, an adulteress haunted by what her husband did to her and the loss of her child – but she has forgotten what falling for someone feels like. And now, well, there's no spectre of a husband looming over her shoulder, no-one to think about but herself, and why not? She's a young woman – she's not going to live her life in solitude because of what happened in the past.

"Yes," she says softly. "Where?"

"I didn't have much thought beyond asking the question. The woods? At about two?"

She nods, and behind her, she knows that he's smiling.

* * *

In actual fact, it is his turn to be offered a pass to the local town – to spend time have a proper bath and getting rid of the ever-present dirt that clings to absolutely everyone at the hospital as a side-effect of tent life, or indulging in food ten times better than that of the mess. But having time off is rare, and having it off at the same time as the VADs is practically a blue moon, and in any case, being able to meet Kitty – she has practically demanded that he call her that – is far more important. The hotel can wait until next month.

But he knows of someone who could use it more than he can, and after breakfast as he approaches the tent, Miles is straightening his tie and positively beaming like a cat that got the cream.

"I could kiss you," he says as Thomas ducks under the tent flap.

"Please don't," he replies dryly, and Miles laughs.

"God knows why you want to give up your pass, but I'm not complaining."

As a matter of fact, Thomas is thanking God that Miles doesn't know the reason why. If he did, Thomas wouldn't hear the end of it for weeks.

"I leave a dispirited man, broken by despair, and return with renewed optimism and vigour."

"Most likely you'll return with a dose of the pox. You'll be sweating mercury for weeks and _I _will not brook any complaining."

"Small price to pay," Miles grins at him, straightening his hat. "What are you going to do, now that you've given up your pass?"

"Tidy the tent," Thomas echoes Kitty's words from earlier. "Perhaps I'll do some darning."

"You won't put that one past me – I've seen your attempts at sewing. They look like a drunken ant has stumbled across your shirt."

Thomas snorts in amusement. "Go on, you're wasting time. Piss off."

Miles laughs and disappears out. Thomas sits down onto his bed, checking his watch. An hour to go. Only an hour.

* * *

"Stop loitering, Trevelyan. Go and wash these," Sister Quayle orders as she passes Kitty on the boardwalk, dropping a basket of sheets and dirty bandages into her arms.

"Yes, Sister," Kitty says, trying to keep her tone as neutral as possible. Odious woman. But the laundry is usually deserted and it won't take long to dump these in a pail of boiling water and disinfectant and hang them out to dry. Then it's out to the woods…to meet Thomas…her stomach flips at the thought. It's been such a long time since she met someone – the secrecy of it all thrills through her. She knows that – technically she is not supposed to be 'courted' by any of the men, officer or patient alike, but the rules can always be bent and she understands that as long as they are discreet, there won't be any trouble.

The laundry, however, is not deserted and she sees Flora bent over a pail of water, pinching her cheeks and biting her lip to make them red. She stifles a laugh – she's not the only one who is thinking about someone.

"I wonder what ward you might be going to," Kitty says as she puts the basket down behind Flora, who straightens up immediately and tries to look innocent. It doesn't work. "Let me guess…"

"I don't know what you mean," Flora says, a giggle in her voice.

"He likes you too," Kitty says. She's seen the way the young private's eyes follow Flora, has seen the way he blushes when she's near and the way his friends rib him when she goes out of earshot.

"Really?" Flora drops all pretences, looking so hopeful that Kitty has to smile. "No, he doesn't. He never even looks at me, how could he like me? And anyway, we're not supposed to get sweet on any of the boys."

"There's a lot of things we're not supposed to do," Kitty shrugs.

"Do you really think he might like me a little?"

Kitty is about to reply when the stern voice of Matron bursts their bubble of privacy. "Are you prattling, Marshall?"

"No, Matron."

Matron has not softened towards Flora at all in the past two and a half months and now, her steely gaze rakes up towards Flora's headdress, which is, as always, wonky. "Your uniform is incorrect, Marshall, _how _many times do I have to tell you?"

Kitty turns and begins to wash the sheets Sister Quayle had given her, so that she too cannot be accused of slacking. She hears Flora's feet click off down the boardwalk, and expects that Matron will go soon, but she doesn't.

"Do you know of a Mr Elliott Vincent?"

Kitty freezes, shock coiling in the pit of her stomach like snakes. How…how did Elliott find her here, he didn't know she had volunteered, he was supposed to leave her alone!

"I do, Matron," she forces out, turning to face her. "Why?"

"Because this has come from Headquarters. It's not so much a request as a command – clearly Mr Vincent has some influence. He's insisted that you meet him in town today."

Kitty takes the proffered piece of paper, reading it quickly. It is an order, she knows what he's like. He's masked it with polite words for the sake of those who had seen it before her, but she knows she has to go and she doesn't want to because she was going to meet Thomas and fear is making her heart beat faster because when she ran away she was going to become invisible and never have to face him again…

"Is he a relative?"

A noise of assent is all Kitty can manage.

"Someone who could aid you with your family situation - in regards to your child?"

"Potentially." She hadn't thought of that – if he's here, perhaps her darling Sylvie is, maybe she'll see her daughter again – it's a slim chance, but one she's willing to take.

"If you're at the entrance by two o'clock, there may be a lift for you," Matron says, taking the piece of paper from Kitty's hands and turning away.

Two o'clock – that's in fifteen minutes time – only long enough to change, not long enough to get word to Thomas…she could tell one of the other girls to pass on a message, but they're both on the wards and unlikely to see him and she doesn't want them knowing, not yet, at least…

What is she going to do?

* * *

**A/N **Okay, guys...if you can get me to 100 reviews this chapter, then I will post the next one - a big moment - tomorrow morning, as early as I can wake up! Thank you to Ani, anon, and the Guest reviewers - I'm really glad you like my story. And on a side note, any requests post-series or between episodes 5 and 6 are very, very welcome!


	22. Elliott (Anger, Fear)

**XXII. Elliott (Anger, Fear)**

With regret gnawing into her heart like mice at a piece of cheese, Kitty quickly changes into her going-out uniform, picks up her bag with the little bit of money in it, and walks briskly to the gate. She's hoping that she'll see Thomas as she walks through the hospital, hoping for a chance to explain, but he's nowhere.

At two o'clock, she's waiting by a smart car, hands folded neatly in front of her and trying not to let her fear show. As she watches a small convoy draws up – two trucks and a cart. If only it were bigger, her free time would have been cancelled and she could have stayed here…but she chides herself for thinking like that. A bigger convoy means more injured, more work, the hospital stretching and stretching until it eventually tears like an overused piece of cloth.

"Well, Miss Trevelyan, it seems as though God is smiling on me today." She jumps at his voice, but doesn't turn, irritation humming through her veins. Why, when she's already so scared and overwrought does she have to put up with Miles' flirting? Why?

About half-way through the journey, her patience snaps like a piece of string tied too tightly. It's not Miles' fault really – he is just talking to get rid of the uncomfortable silence that permeates the car, but then he takes it too far. Panic rises in her like a wave and she fumbles with the handle on the car door.

"What are you doing?" he shouts, trying to stop her with one hand whilst keeping the car on the road with the other.

"I'm getting out!" Kitty snaps, finally releasing the door and jumping free. His talk about the bath had been too much – is it not bad enough that she has to face Elliott today, does she have to deal with Miles too?

She begins to walk, she's got to get away, to get away. Faintly she hears his protests through the anger throbbing in her ears, and then there's a hand on her shoulder and she flinches away. "Take your damn hands off me!"

"You are being ridiculous!"

She ignores him and continues walking down the road, towards where she can see a church tower rising out of the trees. Then the car drives up beside her.

"I'll be outside the hotel at five, and whilst I know you would prefer it, you can't walk back. We'll return in stony silence and one last thing – I give up."

Then the car accelerates away in a cloud of exhaust fumes and Kitty keeps walking, the fear in her stomach coiling, around and around and around.

* * *

The town is small and quaint and she finds the hotel easily, a tall building with a handsome façade and a short, stout doorman standing to attention like a shiny black beetle. She hesitates for a second – she can still run, get away, never have to see him again, but the lure of seeing her daughter pulls her forward like a light in the sky. Sylvie. She has to think of Sylvie.

Inside the hotel she gives the name, and the kindly-looking maître d'hôtel takes her dark blue coat and hat, and a maid in starched black and white shows her to a table in the parlour-room. It's beautiful in here, undamaged by the war with the silent portraits standing sentinel around the walls and flowers bursting from vases in fountains of colour.

There's a dainty china tea set in front of her with a steaming teapot, and though her mouth is dry she cannot risk drinking anything. She begins to fiddle with her leather gloves, resting them on the table and as her hand brushes the silver cake-fork, an idea suddenly comes to her. Slowly, carefully, she slides it into the sleeve of her blouse, so if need be she has a way of defending herself. The cool metal against her skin goes a long way towards calming her.

Even as she sits here, she can feel eyes watching from behind.

* * *

He paces around in the clearing. Perhaps she's lost, perhaps she went to the wrong part of the woods. But no, this is the easiest place here by the laundry and the most obvious. It's the place where all the tracks lead to.

Perhaps she's been seen by Sister Quayle or Matron, but there's nothing wrong in going for a walk in the woods on her free afternoon. He paces, back and forth, back and forth. Maybe they cancelled her free time, maybe the convoy arriving this afternoon is bigger than expected.

Disappointment claws into his heart with cruel nails, but he tells himself to be reasonable. There will be an explanation. He's sure of it.

* * *

After half an hour of waiting, there are silent footsteps behind her. At least, they would have been silent to anyone else, but she has taught herself to be attuned to the signs of her husband's – _ex_-husband's – presence.

"Catherine." His voice sends chills of fear down her spine, as though someone was trickling freezing water and she clenches her fists in her lap to keep from betraying it. It's no good showing him that she's still scared, she's got to stay in control.

"Elliott," she manages, stifling a flinch as his fingers trail slightly across her shoulder.

"You look well." He settles comfortably into the chair across from her, colourless eyes trained on her face. He gives a quick order over his shoulder, and she forces herself to sit straight, not to wilt under his cold, cruel glare. "A nurse, a ministering angel. I can't deny that I wasn't surprised when I heard."

She forces herself to speak. "I thought you would have been too busy to leave England."

"I am," he drawls. "But it was imperative to see you, and to start proceedings."

She raises one shoulder in a tiny shrug – the one her mother always told her off for, and he retrieves a packet of papers from inside his jacket, placing them in front of her with a pen.

"You need to acknowledge your confession. I want the whole sordid business cleaned up quickly."

The word confession strikes a blow into her heart. She never confessed, not properly. It is all the work of his lawyers, from what he thought he knew – that she was the adulterous wife who had an affair right under his nose. But it was more than that, she knows, more than that. James was a safe place to hide away from the blows and the pain, and it took weeks to discover how much she wanted the touch of a normal man who didn't use her for his twisted fantasies.

"I didn't write this," she says, skimming the printed text.

"I want to marry again," he replies. "And you will co-operate – those are the facts are they not?"

She nods slowly. This is her ticket to freedom, away from him, but also away from Sylvie. Why hasn't he brought up their daughter yet? Why?

But if he doesn't get what he wants, she knows he's perfectly capable of shaming her, thoroughly and publicly. So she takes the pen, signs quickly and hands it back to him. The papers disappear back into his jacket and he leans back in his chair easily.

"Go on. Ask me. I know you want to."

"How is she?" The words burn as they flutter out of Kitty's mouth.

"She's very well," he says slowly, tormenting Kitty with glimpses of what she knows she's never allowed to see again. "Getting taller, losing her baby teeth. She's gone to live with my sister-in-law and her cousins – don't you think that's better for the child? She has the very best and she's happy – isn't that what all mothers want for their children?"

Kitty blinks back the sudden tears that are forming in her eyes. She does want her daughter to have the best, but isn't the best her mother's love? She had that and everything she could have ever asked for with Kitty, and she knows Sylvie. Sylvie has never liked her Aunt Beatrice, and her cousins Charles and Louise always used to ignore her because she was the baby. She can't believe what Elliott is saying, she knows she can't believe it. Not until she sees Sylvie happy with her own eyes.

"Does she ask for me?"

"You scared her, Kitty. You scared me. You shouldn't have taken her away like that." His words crush the little bird of hope fluttering in her chest.

"May I write to her?" It's a futile question, Kitty knows it, but Elliott has seen the weakness in her eyes like he is a predator and she is his prey and there's no point trying to conceal it now.

"Saying what, exactly?"

"I just don't want her to think I've forgotten her," she whispers. "That I don't love her more than my own life, that I don't think about her every minute of every day…"

"You can tell her yourself," Elliott interrupts her smoothly, pushing a room-key across the table.

Kitty's heart leaps into her mouth as she stares at the silver-grey key lying on the white tablecloth. "She's here?"

"Go easy on her. It's been a long day and she's tired."

Those are the words she's been longing to hear. She snatches the room key and begins to walk quickly, the little bird beating its wings frantically against the cage of her ribs. She'll see her daughter again! After seven long months, she'll see her beloved Sylvie again, and oh, what a moment it will be!

Once past the staff in the front hall, she begins to run up the staircase. _Oh Sylvie, Sylvie, if you only knew how much I've dreamed of this moment!_

She finally reaches the top of the stairs, pelts along the corridor, looking for the room and then she's found it and after a second's pause she takes the fork out of her blouse sleeve. There's no reason for it now, not when her daughter waits behind that closed door. Then she's unlocking it and going in and taking a deep breath and "Sylvie? Sylvie, my little monkey? Sylvie, it's Mummy, it's Mummy…"

That's when she hears the door close and lock behind her.

And it's when she knows it's all been a trick.

* * *

**A/N **Guys, thank you so much! I've never gotten to 100 reviews in my life before, so thank you! Also, to Guest - this story is mainly about Kitty/Thomas, but I'm planning on writing a series of oneshots about Rosalie at some point when I can get them figured in my head! N xx


	23. Saved (Entangled)

**XXIII. Saved (Entangled)**

It's a quarter to five and he's just putting his cap on his head, packing up his book and quickly tidying the tea-set. He'd better be down early, in case Miss Trevelyan gets any ideas of trying to walk home again.

Then he hears the crash, and a gasping, breathless scream.

He bolts to the door, unlocking it and pulling it open and so shocked at what he sees he doesn't even think but steps out in front of the man advancing towards a sobbing Miss Trevelyan, crumpled in a heap on the floor. "I rather think not," he says sharply.

"This is private. Don't interfere."

"I'm afraid I must. Please step back."

The man gives him a patronising look, as though Miles is an errant schoolboy, but takes a step back, a snakelike smile playing around the corner of his mouth. Miss Trevelyan keeps sobbing, gasping, with a fork held out in front of her like a weapon – not that it would do any good.

That look makes Miles hackles rise and he glares at the man. "That's a fine way for an Englishman to treat a serving nurse."

"A whore in nurse's uniform is still a whore," the man counters, quick as lightening. His gaze shifts over Miles' shoulder. "Isn't that right? On your back, knees to the sky?"

Anger falls over Miles' vision like a haze. It doesn't matter what someone's done in the life before; Miss Trevelyan is a woman and should _not _be treated so. "I'll have your name, sir."

But the man turns insolently, and begins to walk away. Miles steps after him. "Don't turn your back on me, I hold the King's Commission."

"A captain in the RAMC?" The man laughs coldly. "Come back when you're Field Marshal."

He walks away, slow, loping, and Miles begins to follow him, to demand that he give his name, but then he's gone and Miss Trevelyan's sobs are quieting. He curses under his breath and turns back towards her. She's levered herself into a shaking standing position, the fork still clenched in white-knuckled hands like it's her lifeline. Her eyes are red and swollen, and her whole body trembles violently as though she's a leaf in a gale.

He turns, and takes a few steps towards her, pity that he knows she won't want welling up from somewhere inside him. He retrieves her bags and gives them to her. "Are you alright?"

It's an idiotic question, he knows that, but it's the only thing he can think of to say. Now he knows why she was so on edge in the car, earlier. She knew she was going to meet that man, and now look at her – gone is the haughty façade, the imperious glance. She's terrified, and he almost touches her shoulder but stops himself just in time. She doesn't need another man's touch, not after what she's just been through.

"I think it's time we should be getting back," she whispers.

He nods, and begins to lead the way downstairs.

* * *

In the car, he silently offers her his handkerchief to clean the tears from her face so that no questions will be asked when they reach the hospital, and makes sure he sits as far away from her on the front seat as he can manage.

It's dark and the stars are twinkling like knife-points in the sky by the time they get back to the hospital. Kitty has managed to slow her breathing, to calm herself down, although she knows her near-miss will haunt her dreams for weeks.

As the car pulls to a stop near the mess, she opens the door and jumps down, shivering at the icy kiss of the night air. It's nearing the end of October, and winter is well on its way. She turns as Miles slams the car door behind him, trying to find a way to say thank you.

He saves her from making the first move. "I won't gossip," he says, an almost smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.

"Thank you," she says quietly, clutching her bag tightly. "Miles."

"There's nothing to thank me for. Take care of yourself – I might see you on the wards tomorrow morning."

"Alright," she nods, and begins to walk. She needs to get out of this uniform, to send it to the laundry to get rid of the smothering feeling of Elliott's hands on the material. And then she has to find Thomas, she has to apologise…she doesn't know what she's going to say to him. She can't face being with him when all she can think about now is Elliot's cold, colourless eyes and the awful, gut-wrenching fear…

No. She'll cross that bridge when she comes to it. Not sooner, not later.

* * *

She's in the mess, forcing herself to eat something and drink a bit of water. She hasn't since lunchtime, and she knows she should be famished, but fear and nerves both have a curious way of robbing someone of their appetite.

When she next looks over her shoulder, he's ducking into the tent, holding his cap under his arm.

She stands, and begins to walk out the other way, knowing somehow that he will follow her. She passes soldiers due back down the line tonight joking and laughing with the fearlessness of young men, goes out into the inky blackness. Where can they go where no-one will overhear them?

The quartermaster's store. Soper will be in the mess at this time of night, and it's an absolute maze of boxes and crates – they'd know if someone was coming.

The straw from the horses stables crunches under her feet as she wends her way past the tottering towers of supplies that are needed to keep a base hospital going, deeper and deeper into the maze until she's sure that no-one will find them. His footsteps follow her, quiet but not silent, his breathing echoing in the still air.

She turns and then he's there, and they're staring at each other through the starlit darkness, two shadows in the gloom. "I couldn't get a message to you," she says quietly, apologetically. "I was given a pass."

"No-one turns down a pass," he says as though it's alright. "You'll have made Miles' day."

There's a distinctly bitter edge to his tone, now, and she cringes. She didn't mean to hurt him can't he see that? She's sure that if she told him what happened today, who she had to meet, he would be more forgiving, but she can't, it feels as though there's a lead weight on her tongue. Not yet, dear God, she can't tell him yet. Because if she tells him one thing, the whole sordid tale will come spilling out and he'll be disgusted and walk away and she doesn't know if she'll survive that, not after what James did…

"I only saw him in the car. He was polite, nothing more." Thomas takes a step towards her, and whilst she knows that he would never hurt her, not like Elliott would, sudden panic rises in her throat. She feels trapped and she can't think straight and… "The thing is…maybe it was for the best. Not meeting."

"Why?" He sounds confused, as though he hasn't understood her properly.

"I'd be the one sent home if we were caught, not you. I can't be sent home, I _can't._"

A crack. Suddenly, Thomas' hands are on her arms, pulling her down so that they won't be seen. He's so very close, his blue eyes staring into hers with an emotion that she can't quite define. The footsteps retreat, and his hands are still warm on her arms and part of her wants to kiss him, here and now, but she can't and the panic is rising higher and higher like floodwater and…

He leans in, slowly, but she pushes him away. "I came here to work, not to get entangled."

It begins to rain, as though the sky is weeping. He stands abruptly, and whilst his face is expressionless she knows that she's cut him to the quick. Without a word, he turns and walks away, and she is left staring into space wondering what it might have been like if she wasn't too scared.

* * *

**A/N **Poor babies! :( Thank you to all the guest reviewers - I'm really glad that you are enjoying this! :)


	24. Avoidance

**XXIV. Avoidance **

The next weeks are painful. Whenever she dares to try and sleep, nightmares puncture her dreams with their sharp claws and wake her, sweating and gasping for breath, after only a few hours. She can't go and sit outside, on the dunes or in the woods, as temperatures are plummeting with the advent of November, and it would be beyond stupid to risk getting a chill if she's only fleeing from nightmares.

One of these times, she does go out – only to one of the deserted deckchairs that are slowly being brought inside and puffs on a cigarette. The lack of sleep is getting to her – even Nurse Jesmond has commented on the deep, dark circles under her eyes – and she hopes that her exhaustion will keep the nightmares at bay in the coming weeks.

She sleeps better during the day, when she cat-naps, and it's a blessing to have a convoy at night-time now, when she can put aside the dreams and help to begin putting shattered men back together again.

Flora is completely over the moon and has been ever since her soldier left for the front – not because he'd gone, of course, but because he'd kissed her. Kitty always smiles fondly when she remembers the way Flora burst into the tent late that night. Joan was on night duty and Rosalie had been sleeping, and Flora had been beaming from ear to ear. It had taken Kitty several tries to finally find out why she was so happy, whilst Kitty was so pleased for her friend, she was still thinking about her mindless terror and the wounded look in Thomas' blue, blue eyes.

And now, well. He avoids her. If she's coming down the boardwalk, he'll turn and go in the opposite direction or duck into one of the wards. If she approaches him in the mess, he'll stand up and leave. If they have to speak to each other, he never looks her in the eye, never uses her name. It's hurting, aching deep inside to be treated like this, and she knows she brought it on herself, but she can't help but feel angry with herself and with him.

It's one night, several weeks after the incident when her nightmares are more lurid than usual and she can't face staying in the tent, no-matter how cold it is outside. When she reaches her usual haunt, though, there's a shadow sitting on her deck-chair, the orange glow of the cigarette floating in the air like a firefly.

She is about to turn to go back when the voice that belongs to the cigarette speaks up. "Stay."

It's Miles.

She hesitates for a second, then sits down on the next deck chair along and he turns to look at her. "Couldn't sleep?"

"No," she says. "You?"

"Tom's writing, and whatever I tell him he won't stop tapping away at that typewriter of his. I left before I could get properly annoyed."

A companionable silence falls like a curtain, and in the darkness cocooning around them, Kitty lets herself relax against the seat, close her eyes for a second. The boom of the guns in the distance is almost comforting after three months though she knows to those poor men on the front line it is anything but.

She is almost half-asleep when Miles speaks up again, jerking her out of her thoughts "That man…was he your husband?"

She starts, and as the words sink in, shame settles like a stone in the bottom of her stomach. "It's really none of your business."

"I know it isn't," he says. The light of the cigarette draws a fiery trail through the air. "I really do, but I've seen you out here a lot recently when you should be asleep and well…it's what they say, isn't it? A problem shared is a problem halved."

She doesn't know how to tell him – she's wanted to tell someone so badly, to have someone take _her _side for once, but the fear has put a lock on her tongue, and she's sure that she would never be able to get the words out, at least, not all at once. But this is her chance, and after what he witnessed that day in the hotel, she knows that Miles will be a sympathetic ear.

"Yes, that man was my husband."

His silence is more probing than any other question could be, and that gives her the courage to continue.

"He…wanted a divorce because I…I made a mess of things." She takes a slow, trembling breath. "He's not allowing me to see our daughter, and, well, that's what keeps me up at night – I can't bear the thought of her…" She stops abruptly. "I can't talk about this."

"It's alright," Miles says carefully as though she's a wounded animal. "It's alright. Though from what I saw I would happily kill the bastard for you if it would make the situation any better. Or I'd get Tom to do the deed for me, though now he probably wouldn't – he's angry at me, I think, and I've no idea why."

Kitty knows just why Thomas is angry and guilt swells like a wave, drowning the words she wants to say, to reassure Miles that Thomas isn't angry with him, not at all, it's her he's angry with and she's trying her very best to corner him and just say sorry, but he keeps avoiding her and…

"You should probably try and get some more sleep," Miles says after a while, standing up in a creaking of wood from the deckchair. "We've got another convoy due tomorrow, and it wouldn't do to have the lovely Miss Trevelyan pass out from exhaustion."

She manages a small smile, even though she knows he won't be able to see it through the blackness of the night. "Thank you," she says, "for listening."

She knows he's smiling as she stands and turns back towards the women's quarters. "Any time!" he calls after her.

* * *

The next day all three of them are assigned to dealing with lunchtime in one of the officers' wards – an actual hut with curtains to separate off each bed if the patients so want it. The food is nicer than that in the men's wards as well, and Kitty watches Rosalie adeptly serve a portion onto each plate. In the background, Corporal Foley – a particular friend of Flora's – is mopping the floor, the mop swooshing back and forth like the waves.

"Tomorrow, we'll have been here for three whole months," Flora says suddenly, breaking Kitty's train of thought.

"I know," Rosalie replies, exasperated at something or other. Who knows – she's always exasperated because of something Kitty's said or done, or because one of Flora's comments offends her prissy sensibilities.

"Don't you think we should throw a do? I mean, we don't particularly need a reason, but it's the perfect reason – we could invite the patients and the staff…"

Kitty is immediately wary. "What kind of do?" As a girl, she was trotted out at too many to show off her singing and meagre skill at the piano in front of her mother's vain, silly, patronising friends, and then, when she was older, in her Season, it was singing that caught the attention of…

"Something little, and fun," Flora muses. "Charades. Songs around a piano, perhaps – wait, I know! People could do their party tricks. I bet you have a party trick, Corporal."

"Yeah," Foley looks at her, almost scathingly. "Mopping."

Flora isn't put off, and for a second Kitty wonders at the oddness of Foley and Flora's friendship – he seems determined to put her down at every single opportunity, but it doesn't put Flora off from talking to him, or laughing with him. If it were Kitty, she would have ended the friendship long ago.

"I can organise it, you can tell people and then whoever wants to come can come!" she says, happy with her little idea.

"I'm not singing," Kitty hastens to say in the gap Flora's pronouncement has left in the conversation.

"Nor me," Rosalie backs her up and Kitty is surprised to have Rosalie on her side even if it's for something as inconsequential as this.

Flora glares at them, but Kitty can tell she's not really angry – in this moment with strands of auburn hair falling out of her cap, she looks more like an irritated kitten than anything else. "Oh for Heaven's Sake, I'll _start _the singing!"

"We want them to get better, not worse," Foley chimes in, almost spitefully if there wasn't a teasing glint in his eyes.

Flora's defences slam up like a drawbridge and she rounds on him. "I'll have you know that at home I'm considered rather tuneful." She snatches three of the plates from Rosalie and marches out into the ward, her blue skirts swaying behind her.

The second she's gone, Rosalie whips around to look at Kitty. "What just happened?"

Kitty shrugs; if she's not singing, then everything is fine. "I think we're throwing a do."

Rosalie sighs. "Well, it's not going to happen unless we get all this work done. Come on."

She begins dishing more food onto more plates, and Kitty takes two and ferries them out to the big table in the middle of the ward. It will be fun, if she's not singing, to have something to ward off the ever approaching winter and the coldness of being avoided.

* * *

The gossip mills of the hospital work fast, and the next morning when she is ironing linen in the linen cupboard, Miles comes in, clipboard in hand and settles himself in the chair by the window. There is silence for a few blissful seconds – nowadays, it seems as though the hospital is never silent – and then he speaks up. "So what sort of do is this going to be? Depravity in the absence of any good sense?"

Kitty sighs. She's been having to fend off questions about this 'do' all day, ever since someone let slip that the VADs are organising it.

"Flora's got charades and songs around the piano more in mind, I think. Tea and biscuits. That sort of thing."

The door creaks open. "They're ready for us in theatre." It's him, Thomas.

"Yes, two minutes," Miles says.

On a whim, Kitty turns around from her ironing board, feeling the sight of him like an ache deep in her stomach. He carefully avoids her gaze. "Are you musical, Captain?"

"No," he replies, shortly, his attention still fixed on Miles. "Two minutes."

And then he's gone, and the ache is receding and why does he have to do this? Why isn't he allowing her to make amends?

"Don't mind him," Miles says. "He's forgiven me for whatever I did wrong, but is taking out his anger by being abrupt with everyone else."

"I don't mind him," Kitty lies.

The door at the other end of the cupboard opens, and Joan comes in, tired circles traced under her eyes and carrying a tall tower of linen in her arms. Joan's been even worse than Kitty, lately, about sleeping, and even though Kitty's up every night with nightmares, Joan's always gone from her bed. She must be worrying about the fiancé that Rosalie so unthinkingly revealed to everyone at Sister Quayle's party a few weeks ago. Though now, the odious woman is on leave – forced leave if the gossip is to be trusted – and it's much easier to snatch a few minutes to rest in between jobs.

"We could do a duet," Miles says, teasing. He sometimes flirts, still, but now Kitty knows that, in all honesty, it's just his way of blocking out of the horrors of the war, and the terrible things he sees day in, day out. "A lush, swooning romantic duet, gazing into each other's eyes, followed by a quick engagement. We become the most talked-about couple in the place, and we can knock Sister Livesy here right off her pedestal."

"For God's Sake!" Joan rounds on him, and Kitty's laughter at the ridiculous image he has just painted dies like a fire with no fuel. "Can't everyone find another subject to discuss?"

Miles and Kitty exchange a glance, and something clicks into Kitty's head. Joan is not merely worried about her fiancé as everyone else seems to believe – she's hiding something about him, and it's driving her slowly but surely towards an absolute breakdown.

"God, is that the time?" Miles says to nobody in particular, standing up and tucking his clipboard back under his arm. "I'd better be going."

Then he shuts the door behind him, and Joan turns back to her linen. Her hands are trembling like pieces of paper blown about by the wind.

"Joan, you're shaking – what's wrong?"

Joan doesn't reply.

"Joan, what is it?"

"Can't you just leave me alone?" Joan is almost-shouting, and there are tears in her eyes as she glares at Kitty. "I just want _everyone _to _leave me alone_! Is that too much to ask?"

And being in the same position, where she has a secret that she really wants no-one to know, Kitty nods, slowly, carefully as though any sudden movement will cause Joan to shatter like china.

"Alright," she whispers. "Alright."

* * *

**A/N **Here's the next one! Review - it'll make me smile during a week of Greek Exams!


	25. The Do (Dance to Your Tune)

**XXV. The Do (Dance to Your Tune)**

Several nights later, Kitty is in the wards again, helping Nurse Jesmond with her dressings round. It is long work, cleaning and re-bandaging, cleaning and re-bandaging, and her arms ache from holding out the long strips of cloth and basins of iodine solution, though slowly, ever so slowly, they are beginning to use Carrel-Dakin solution for the cleaning of wounds as it is cheaper and much easier for the volunteers to mix up.

"So I hear that you're singing tomorrow night," Nurse Jesmond says as she ties off the last bandage and straightens up, rubbing her chapped hands together. It is getting colder, and constantly running between the wards, from warm to cold to warm again is taking its toll.

"Yes, we are," Kitty says, shaking her head; in all honesty she didn't know Flora, sweet, bright Flora, could be so manipulative when she wanted to.

"Well, it'll be a nice break. Bring us all together."

"Flora's words exactly," Kitty says, pouring fresh disinfectant into a basin and dunking her hands into it, scrubbing over and over again. That's the problem with the endless dressing rounds and chapped hands from the freezing wind that howls down from the north and the mud and rain. Infections get into any cuts and make them swell and weep pus, and if it spreads to the rest of the body, well, hospitals have no space for sick nurses. Only last week Matron was exhorting absolutely everyone to wash their hands in Carrel-Dakin solution after every round, every operation. "Are you doing anything, Nurse Jesmond?"

"Me, Heavens no. I can't hold a tune to save my life – though some of the others are doing that number from The Mikado – the Three Little Maids, I think it's called."

"That's nice," Kitty says. She hates the Mikado, just like she hates singing in front of an audience. It just reminds her of that outing at the end of her first Season, where she had to hold Elliott's arm and smile as though she was delighted to be engaged, and chatter to several of his female relatives in the party all about the wedding, cakes and dresses and flowers.

"Well, it will be, won't it?"

"Is there anything else that needs doing? I've got a rehearsal soon."

"You could take these to theatre, if you have time. Captain Gillan said to bring whatever we have left." Nurse Jesmond gestures to the crate of cleaned, unused bandages from the very bottom of the trolley.

Even the sound of his name makes Kitty's gut twist. What is happening to her?

"Yes, of course." She takes them from the trolley, the rough grains of the box grating against her fingers like sand, and begins to walk. There's only one door into each room in the theatre. If he's not doing an operation, then she might be able to corner him. To apologise or to make amends. She has no idea what she's going to say if she can get him alone, but…she left her old life to avoid complications, not to step into another tangle of problems winding around her like a snake. Why can't everything be normal?

* * *

He is cleaning up after his last operation of the day, arranging supplies into neat rows and cleaning equipment, a mindless task to try and take the thoughts out of his head. Today, he almost began amputating before he had tied the tourniquet, all because he was thinking about dark eyes and hair curling from the corners of her headdress and the coldness of rejection rather than the figure lying prone beneath the operating sheet before him.

The curtain rustles, and almost as if she has sprung from his mind into reality, she is there, carrying the box of bandages and putting it on the table at the other end of the tent. There is a slow pause, pregnant with tension. Then she turns to him, stepping so close that he can feel her warmth radiating across the space between them. "Tom, are we really going to keep ignoring each other?"

He stops cleaning the scalpel in his hands. Why is she doing this, when she so clearly rejected him before? Why is she suddenly trying to run back to him, when it is obvious that she doesn't want him? "I'd prefer it, Miss Trevelyan."

She doesn't move, and he turns to reach the next dirty instrument. She is still there, blocking his path like a rock. "You're in my way."

Slowly, deliberately, she takes a step backwards and he snatches the instrument, pours disinfectant so quickly that it splashes up at him.

"Can't we at least be civil?" she asks, and there is a tremor in her voice, like his little sisters always used to have whenever they were hurt.

The question makes him angry, an anger that he hasn't felt in a long time. She hurts him, cuts him to the quick with a rejection when she's been leading him on for weeks on end with shy glances and smiles ever since he let on how he felt about her and now, _now _she wants to be civil? "I avoid you for a reason," he bites out, for once letting his emotions get the better of his control. "That's got to be clear. And now, you are in my way, expecting me to do what, exactly? Come running when you click your fingers? I'm sorry to ruin your fun."

"You think I'm having fun?" A furious, incredulous blush is rising up her cheeks.

"I don't know," he says, bitterly. "Maybe this is entertaining for you. Maybe you collect men and tie us up in knots for your amusement; well, find another man to dance to your tune because it's not going to be me."

Before he even knows it, she's slapped him, harder than he ever thought a woman could, and anger and something else rises in him along with the stinging in his cheek. He pulls her close, so close that he can feel her breath on his face, and then beneath the cloud of his anger, he realises that there isn't fury in her eyes but fear, fear twisting like knotted ropes and why is she scared?

Then he releases her, guilt rising like the tide in his throat. Forcing it under control, he turns and marches out of the tent, into the gathering darkness.

* * *

"Nice handprint," Miles says as Thomas ducks into the tent. "What happened?"

"Leave me alone, Miles," Thomas scowls at his friend as he marches to his desk, rummaging through his papers without thinking. He's not in the mood to be teased – surely Miles can read the signs?

"You do know bottling up your anger never works," Miles continues. "You remember what happened when you did that with the Yelland issue."

"Damn it, Miles," Thomas glares at him for a second. This is not the time for Miles' inane questioning, not when he's wracked with guilt over the fear in her eyes. Why was she scared? "What do I have to say to make you leave me alone?"

"Nothing, if you don't want to. You've just been angry for too long, and it's probably about time you get it off your chest."

Miles' words are so similar to something Thomas' mother used to say when he was small that he drops the papers and slumps into his chair. "It was Miss Trevelyan."

"Pardon?"

"You wanted to know what happened. Miss Trevelyan slapped me."

"Why on earth would Miss Trevelyan slap you? You told me that you'd barely spoken to her!"

"That was months ago, Miles."

"Yes, but, how on earth did you get her angry enough to slap you?"

Well, it's too late to turn tail and run from telling Miles the truth. "I said some things I shouldn't have."

"Like what?"

"You are too nosy for your own good, you know?" Thomas says. "She and I were going to meet, the day I gave you the pass."

Miles raises an eyebrow. "I thought something fishy was going on – you turning down a pass – but honestly I was too grateful for the opportunity to go into town to question it."

"Yes, well…we started talking after, well, after a few weeks and when she didn't turn up, we met later that day when she got back from town and she was suddenly so cold…and now she wants to be civil again, and, God, Miles, what do I do?"

"Accept her apology," Miles says frankly. "Women are mysterious creatures, and it's best just to follow their lead."

"I don't understand why she was so distant that evening though…"

"Look, Tom, I've noticed that Miss Trevelyan is well, fragile, at times when it comes to matters of the heart. She doesn't like being trapped."

"How do you know?"

"I spent an entire car ride into and out-of town with her and she was on-edge the entire time. Well…" Miles pauses, deliberating something for a second – Tom can see the thoughts turning over and over in the back of his eyes. "Just take it from me. Some women are like that, and there's nothing you can do to change it."

"Alright." Tom sighs. It makes sense, if she doesn't like being trapped, that she seemed so scared that night in the quartermaster's store. The sudden fear in her eyes barely half-an-hour ago makes sense as well, because with his hands around her waist, she was like a butterfly caught in a collector's net. He isn't much better though, he's drawn to her like a moth to a flame and nothing is able to distract him, absolutely nothing at all.

"Are you going to come to this little 'do' Miss Marshall is putting on?" Miles changes the subject.

"I don't know. I suppose you are."

"Yes, it'll be a good evening off. They're all singing something – the VADs, I hear. It'll be nice if you'd put in an appearance."

"I'll see," Tom says. "I'll see."

* * *

It's late the next afternoon, and Kitty's in the wards, dressing some of the easier wounds when she hears the patter of small footsteps, a rustle of grass. She and Corporal Foley exchange a glance, and he ducks out. Seconds later, she hears "Anglais?"

Knowing that that is the extent of Foley's French, she puts down the bowl of antiseptic, and follows him out. There, standing and looking around is the mute little Belgian girl that Joan tended to a few weeks ago when she burned herself, Mathilde, Kitty thinks her name is. Her father is nowhere to be seen.

"What's she doing here?" she asks as Foley steps aside with a shrug.

"No idea, Nurse."

"Ou est ton papa, ma cherie?" Kitty drops to her knees in front of the girl, takes her small hands, trying desperately not to think of Sylvie. The water on the grass soaks through her skirt and layer of petticoats. "Ou est ton papa?"

The little girl stares at her, fear rising in her dark eyes that seem too big for the delicate frame of her face, and then she begins to pull at Kitty's hand insistently. "Oui, je viens," Kitty says, standing and allowing Mathilde to pull her along, down towards one of the gates to the hospital, Foley following them.

It takes only ten minutes to get to the village, and Mathilde stops abruptly, clutching Kitty's hand like it's her lifeline.

"I'll go and look for him," Foley says, beginning an ungainly jog into the squat little cluster of houses.

Then something catches Kitty's eye. The crumpled shape of a man, lying down a side road that leads off to the left, around the village. He is not moving.

"Reste là," she tells the little girl before beginning to run towards the figure.

It takes all of two seconds, and then she's kneeling beside him. His arms and legs are splayed like he's a toy tossed down by a tantrum-throwing child, and there is blood congealing on his face, bruises blossoming around his eyes. At her shadow falling over his face, his eyelids begin to flutter.

There is the sound of running feet, then, and Foley appears at the top of a rock outcrop above her. "Shit," he says, glancing at the man, then to Kitty. "Sit tight. I'll be back."

And then he's off, and the child's father's eyelids are opening and he's staying blearily at her. "It's Joan," he says weakly. "Joan…go to the house…waiting for you…in the house…"

"Ssh," Kitty says, gently smoothing his hair back from his wounded forehead with apprehension fluttering like butterflies in her stomach. What is waiting for Joan in the house? "Ssh, stay still."

"In the house, Joan, go to the house…waiting for you there."

"Yes, I'll go," Kitty says, and he nods and his eyes shut again. He is too still.

When Foley arrives back with two stretcher-bearers fifteen minutes later, Mathilde has come to join Kitty, tears streaking down her cheeks. In a moment of instinct, Kitty takes the little girl in her arms, rocking her back and forth gently. "Hush, petite, hush," she says. "Ton papa ira bien."

She can't remember the last time she held a child like this – the way it felt to have Sylvie's small, warm body tucked against hers is fading too quickly, like a rag left to the mercy of the elements, and she's not ready to let it go.

"We've got him now, Nurse," Foley says, breaking her train of thought. "Do you want me to take the girl?"

"It's alright, Corporal," Kitty says, not wanting to detach Mathilde's arms from around her neck. "I've got her."

It's a long, slow walk back in a drizzle that begins about half-way down the road and when they once again reach the safety of the hospital, a waiting nurse ushers her and Mathilde into Matron's office, where Matron tells Kitty to sit down and stay with the child until her father has been treated. Mathilde has stopped crying, now, and just holds onto Kitty like a she is her mother, and for once, in between murmuring comforting nonsense, Kitty lets herself think of Sylvie.

She remembers the time when Sylvie was born, how she fitted perfectly into Kitty's arms, a warm, pink-faced bundle with wide, beautiful, dark eyes and a tuft of dark hair and how Kitty thought she was so worth the pain of bearing her. She remembers Sylvie's first word – Mama – and her first steps, tottering around holding tightly onto Kitty's fingers. She remembers the first time Sylvie fell out of a tree, and hurt her ankle, and the countless times she would sit with her daughter on her lap, telling her stories that her own nursemaid used to tell to her.

Eventually, Matron re-enters and tells them quietly that Mathilde's father is waking up, that Kitty should take the child to him. And so Kitty does, her fingers wound around Mathilde's until they are in the little private hut that houses injured civilians and Mathilde is running to her father, and crying again.

As she leaves, Joan enters and the words Mathilde's father said to her twist round and around in her mind.

She's got to talk to Joan.

* * *

It's evening, now, and Kitty is hurrying to the chapel where the concert is being held, reeling with the secret she has dug out of Joan like a treasure hunter digging for gold. Joan's fiancé is _German. _German. He's German, and there's a letter waiting for Joan in the village.

Kitty doesn't know quite what to think. It's only a letter Joan said, a letter to tell her whether the love of her life is dead in the mud of the battlefield, or still living. Only a letter. But if she is caught – the consequences are too horrible to even bear thinking about. Court martial. The death sentence.

She's tried to persuade Joan to leave it, tried and tried and tried, but there is nothing to be done. Joan is completely adamant – like a stubborn donkey – that she is going to go. That she has to. And, because Kitty knows what it feels like to be separated from loved ones by barriers that stretch as wide as oceans, she let her.

And now she has a promise to fulfil for Flora.

* * *

He only decides at the last minute to go to the concert, when the hand of God is already studding the blackened night with the twinkle of the stars. It'll probably be too late – the acts have most likely finished – but it's worth a look.

As he approaches the chapel, there is the sound of a piano, a rustling of the wind moving against the canvas. He ducks under the flap, unnoticed by the audience to see the three VADs at the piano, Kitty and Miss Marshall holding hands and singing and the third at the piano, their three voices rising and falling in a beautiful harmony.

But he only has eyes for her.

She's smiling and her dark hair defies her headdress, and slowly, her gaze moves across the audience to land on him. Instead of the anger that has been plaguing him for weeks, there is something else that swells in his chest.

"There's a long, long trail a-winding, into the land of my dreams, where the nightingales are singing and a white moon beams. There's a long, long night of waiting, until my dreams all come true, till the day when I'll be going down that, long, long trail with you."

It strikes him then, all of a sudden as her eyes hold his steadily, dark, dark eyes holding eyes the colour of the waves of the sea.

He's in love with her.

* * *

**A/N Important! **Hello, everyone! Thank you for the reviews, especially to anon. This chapter owes a huge thank you to TheCurlymop, who put up with my constant questions when I was feeling unsure about it - she deserves a big round of applause. And I can officially announce that there are two chapters left after this, and that the sequel is currently in the works. Also, in the next few chapters, I've had to bend history a little - I know that Edith Cavell was shot in October 1915, but it's already the middle of November, so I'm just going to leave it. N xxx.

P.S. French Translations...

Ou est ton papa, ma cherie? - Where is your papa, sweetheart?

Oui, je viens - Yes, I'm coming

Reste la - Stay here

Ton papa ira bien - Your father will be alright.

If anyone can correct me - I used Google Translate - then drop me a review to let me know!


	26. Joan

**XXVI. Joan **

It is dark by the time they've finished their song to rapturous applause, and getting colder. He glances towards Kitty, then inclines his head very slightly towards the door. She nods, and then he's gone, out into the thick night, and she is being pulled into an embrace by a giddy Flora. "We did it!" she is almost squealing, grabbing Rosalie's hand and jumping up and down like a little child in a sweetshop.

"Yes, we did," Rosalie says, but this time, the exasperation in her voice is fond.

People come up to congratulate them – Miles is especially effusive in his praise – and by the time she has fought her way through the throng of compliments with polite smiles and excuses, the wind has picked up and it has begun to rain again.

He is waiting around the side of the chapel, a silhouette that is just blacker than the night. She approaches him, standing at a careful distance. They stare at each other for a few seconds.

Eventually, he speaks. "I'm sorry, for the incident yesterday."

Those simple words are enough, and Kitty manages a small, rueful smile, even though she knows he can't see. He deserves an explanation, he really does, but she doesn't quite know how to give it. "I'm sorry too. I only…I was scared."

They both know what she is talking about.

"I understand."

"No, you don't. It's just…"

He waits silently, patiently.

"I don't…I can't…" she takes a deep breath, floundering for words, completely and totally out of her depth. "I had to meet someone, that day, and…that someone…" she trails off. "I'm sorry, I can't do this."

And before he can plead with her to stay, she turns and goes, her skirt swishing against the damp grass with regrets hanging from her shoulders like lead weights. She knows she has to tell him, she knows it – _he deserves an explanation – _but she can't bear his reaction. She can't bear the thought that there will be pity in his eyes, and then he will leave because no-one in their right mind wants a woman damaged by untamed ghosts that will haunt her until her dying day.

When she enters the tent, neither of the others are there, so she lies woodenly down on the little camp bed, and for the first time in six years, she cries herself to sleep.

* * *

The next thing she knows, someone is shaking her out of her mercifully dreamless sleep. "Kitty, Kitty, wake up!"

"What is it?" she mumbles, irritated at being dragged from the first real _rest _she's had since she arrived here.

"Kitty, you've got to wake up." That's Rosalie, and Kitty groans, opening her eyes blearily and sitting up, brushing escaped strands of hair away from her face.

"I'm awake, I'm awake – why are you dressed? Our shift isn't till seven."

"It's Joan."

Those two words banish the thought of sleep from Kitty's mind like a bucket of cold water being poured over her head. "What's happened to Joan?"

"She's been arrested. We don't know why – only that Soper came in an hour ago with her – she had her hands bound and she's in isolation."

Dread fills Kitty's head, almost choking her. _Oh Joan, I told you not to go! _

"Kitty, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," Kitty manages. "I'm getting dressed – you can go on without me."

"Are you sure?" Flora asks.

"Yes, go," Kitty says, and they both leave, ducking out into the night.

As soon as she's sure they're gone, she puts her head in her hands, guilt wracking at her insides. Why did she not stop Joan when she had the chance? Why?

* * *

By the next morning, the entire hospital knows what has happened, and rumours buzz around like flies. Some say that she resisted arrest, some say that she was seen giving a German her motorcycle and coat, though no-one knows who the German is.

The guilt is driving Kitty mad.

So when she sees him going into the woods that afternoon after coming from the isolation hut, she follows, cautiously, making sure that no-one is watching her. Once they are in the shelter of the bare branches, well away from anyone who could eavesdrop, she speaks.

"How is she?"

He doesn't turn to look at her. "What would you expect?"

The guilt presses down on her chest, forcing the words out of her mouth. "She didn't go to meet him. She thought it was only a letter."

That makes him start, swinging around to look at her with poorly disguised horror on his face. "Did she tell you?"

"I guessed. It didn't take much, really."

The anger forms like a mask settling across his features, and he takes a step towards her. "You knew, but you said nothing?"

"Why are you so angry?" she asks, trying to keep her voice as level as possible. What could she have done – reported Joan for wanting to know whether her fiancé was dead or alive?

"Do you think I amputate limbs for fun? Do you think that I'm constantly in the operating theatre, trying to save men's lives _for fun_? The Germans did this to them, and _she _has been fraternising with them, she could be sending them information for all we know…"

"She's not!" Kitty replies hotly, jumping to Joan's defence. "It was a letter! A letter from her _fiancé! _She wasn't giving information, or anything, she was…"

He's not even listening to her. "A good man could lose his job over this – my boss could be sacked, all because he trusted her as one of the nurses and now his neck is on the block and _you knew and said nothing_." He stares at her for a second, and there is nothing but disgust in his tone as he turns away. "You're as much to blame as she is."

And for the third time, Kitty watches him walk away, taking a piece of her heart with him. How can he not see? How can he be so blind?

And it's only when she returns to her duties that it hits her. What happens if he tells them that she knew? What happens then?

* * *

And then the next day, the other side of the blow falls.

At nine o'clock, a message is sent to all staff to gather in the central quad. Kitty, who has been making more beds and cleaning bedpans all morning whilst hopelessly thinking what else she could have said to try and warn Joan off going for the letter, gets there late and joins the back of the crowd. Matron stands at the front, and Colonel Brett is nowhere to be seen.

"I regret to inform you all that yesterday afternoon, a Red Cross nurse, Edith Cavell, was shot by an enemy firing squad in Belgium for helping Allied prisoners of war escape. We will hold a service this afternoon at three to commemorate her sacrifice for all those who wish to attend."

Cold tendrils of dread snake their way around her heart. Joan and Edith Cavell have committed the same crime. Any leniency that could have been sought will be banished with this news from the other side of the lines. Joan could be shot, like Nurse Cavell, and Kitty knows although it is not her fault, she will carry it with her for the rest of her days as a regret that she will never shed.

And what will happen to her, if Thomas reports her? Will she be shot too, as a co-conspirator? Oh, what her life has become – an adulteress and a German sympathiser – what a story for the tabloids – runaway ex-wife of politician Elliott Vincent shot for aiding the escape of a German prisoner.

Oh what a story. But as her eyes meet his over the dispersing crowd, there isn't the anger she's so used to seeing shining out of them, but confusion. Complete and utter confusion.

* * *

It is later that afternoon, and she's about to refill the trolley for a very harassed Nurse Jesmond when she sees it. A truck drawing to a halt in the centre quad. Three men, smartly dressed in khaki with different regimental buttons on their shoulders. They must be the Intelligence Officers everyone has been talking about. She watches as Thomas crosses from the veranda of Colonel Brett's office, salutes them smartly and turns towards her.

Chills run down her spine with icy fingers as his eyes lock onto hers, as he turns to say something to them. They get closer and closer, and has he reported her, are they going to arrest her here and now in front of mobile patients and nurses but no, they're going past towards the isolation hut and she's safe.

Taking a shaking breath of cool autumn air, she begins to push the trolley again. They're not coming for her, she's fine, she's safe - at least, for the moment.

* * *

**A/N **Penultimate chapter! Thank you for Guest and anon for reviewing, and thank you to anon and Fleurdelys21 for correcting my French. Only one more chapter to go! N xx.


	27. The Curtain Descending

**XXVII. The Curtain Descending**

Rosalie doesn't quite know what to think. At first, when she unwrapped that newspaper from her box of flower bulbs a few days ago, she was shocked, stunned, horrified. Kitty, who she's grown a grudging respect for over the past few weeks, has been lying all this time. On their first day, she called Rosalie a hypocrite, but, no, Kitty herself is the hypocrite, the one running and hiding from the truth.

(She admits that she is running, too, but for an entirely different reason.)

And now, a week later, with Joan's betrayal hanging in the air like smoke, she doesn't know what to do. She knows she's prissy, she knows that she's the embarrassment to her family, and she knows that her stepsister, Vera, sent her the article to shock her.

She's standing on a turning-point, with no map, no compass, no clues. Kitty knows that she knows about her past; when they argued this morning, Rosalie was so angry, so shocked that she was seriously considering announcing the contents of the paper to the world. Shaming Kitty here, as well as in London.

But she knows she's not like that. Scandals that Vera still writes to her about don't shock her anymore, not when she's seen men dead and dying of horrific wounds, not when she's had to face up to her fears and confront what she's always dreaded.

Once upon a time, in another life, Rosalie would have taken the article straight to the newly-returned Sister Quayle. But now, she knows, the past is in the past, history is written by the victor for a reason.

So she goes to the furnace and throws the newspaper in. She's already hurt Joan more than she ever knew she could hurt someone. There's no need to drag up old, shameful ghosts for Kitty too.

* * *

She's back in the supply room again, stacking bandages from the latest delivery. They came to a decision, about Joan, when her fiancé roared into the hospital on the motorbike. They're both going to prison, until the war is over, but then they'll be free. Re-united. She and Miles talked about it when they were having a cigarette break, and it's not good, not by a long shot, but it's better than two unmarked, unremembered graves standing sentinel at the edge of the woods.

And now, well, they've been taken away, Joan and her German. Kitty saw them from the window of the officers' ward where she was making beds, pulling away from the burly soldiers holding them apart and kissing like there was no-one else left in the world. She wonders what it would feel like to be loved like that, to be loved so unconditionally that you would die for that person, because she knows Joan was set on doing just that. She's never had that, not from a parent, not from a husband, not even from a lover, because she realises now that James never really loved her. Not when he delivered her back to her husband when she needed him the most.

As she takes a breath, and begins on the second stack of bandages, her thoughts flit to Rosalie. After the memorial service for brave Edith Cavell, Rosalie had cornered her. I've burned the newspaper, she'd said. Burned it. And then Rosalie had smiled and admitted that Kitty had been right, that first day, about her volunteering to escape. And Kitty had smiled back, reached out and squeezed Rosalie's hand.

"I know," she'd said. "I did too."

And that was the end of that. Months of animosity forgotten, dismissed into thin air. How good it feels to get at least one weight from her shoulders.

She is so lost in her thoughts that she doesn't realise the door has opened until she hears footsteps on the planks. Not just any footsteps, though, his footsteps, quiet, but not silent. She straightens up. He stares at her for a long, slow second.

"The Intelligence Officers," he says, a sort of confused hurt in his tone. "You thought I was bringing them straight for you, didn't you? You actually believed I'd deliver you up and watch them drag you away?"

She takes a breath. There's no space for lies between them, not now, not after everything that's happened. "Yes," she replies, quiet.

He shakes his head slowly, raking his hand through his hair. "How could you think that? You drive me mad, but I'd never hurt you."

Those words strike a chord deep inside her. I'd never hurt you. How long she's wished someone would say that to her, that someone would care enough to tell her that. She breathes slowly through her nose, in and out. In this moment, it hits her. He needs to know. She has to tell him. Her past, her secrets, cannot remain unspoken any longer. _He needs to know. _

The silence between them is like a gorge in a cliff, and only she can build the bridge across to the other side.

"The reason I came here from England," she begins hesitantly. "Is because I have a daughter I'm not allowed to see."

"Why not?"

"Because…" she takes a breath, gathering her courage close. "Because I made a terrible, terrible mess of things. I made such a mess."

He looks at her, then with such tenderness that she wants to cry. "What's she like?" he asks, gently. "Your daughter?"

Kitty stares at him, trying to think of something to say. He takes a hesitant step closer. "Her name's Sylvie," she says, letting all the memories of her daughter well up from the dark place where she buried them the day Elliott threw her out of the house. "She's six. She loves climbing trees. She hates wearing shoes. She wants a dragon for Christmas."

He smiles at that, a proper, wonderful smile that keeps the tears that are choking her voice at bay. Not that tears could stop her now. "She's beautiful, and fearless…she really is such a fierce, spiky little thing…"

"I can't see where she got that from," he says, and then she's laughing through the tears dribbling down her cheeks. She wipes them away with her sleeve, and he steps even closer, but she isn't trapped this time and she just longs to be held, comforted, _loved…_

The door opens, and one of the nurses appears pushing another trolley, which she begins to load. Thomas steps past her, as if to go, and she touches his sleeve, whispering so quietly that it sounds like a breath of wind. "Meet me, in the same place, in an hour. I'll be there, but I understand if you're not."

And then she's turning back to the task at hand, and he is shutting the door behind him.

_Please, please, let him come._

* * *

The woods are deserted, and a lone bird cries a warning call from one of the trees as she enters the clearing, pushing her way through the brambles and scrub. It's cold here, now, and getting colder. The clouds gathering above the treetops get thicker and thicker every day, heavy with the promise of clean, white snow. The promise of beginnings.

She hears his footsteps before she sees him, and then he is there, emerging from one of the other paths that come from the officers' quarters.

They watch each other for a few, long seconds. And then she is in his arms, kissing him and kissing him, and the heavy wool of his coat is scratching through her uniform and layers of petticoats, and for the first time in her whole life, she feels complete.

When they finally break apart, staring into each other's eyes, there are no more words to be said, no words to describe the incredible lightness that diffuses through her from top to toe. There is no going back to the way things used to be, no return to fear, monotony, pain. With Thomas' arms around her, she feels safe, she feels wanted, and she feels loved.

It is ending, and it is beginning.

The curtain has descended on her old life, and is rising on her new.

* * *

**A/N Important! **Oh my goodness, guys, it's finished! This is without a doubt, the longest story I have _ever _written, and I want to thank you all for sticking by me. A huge thank you to TheCurlymop and her screen-caps for when the episodes went off Iplayer - they literally saved my life. Thank you to Kate, anon, and kayjay - Kate, it's alright, the sequel will hopefully start posting on Saturday.

And, on that subject, I am very pleased to announce that the sequel is called _'Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made On.'_

Well, this is goodbye, people - until then! N xxx


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